


Guardian Blue - Sheepless in New Reynard

by Alps_Sarsis



Series: Guardian Blue [9]
Category: Zootopia (2016)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Danger, Fear, Friendship, Mystery, Personal Growth, Pineapples, Redemption
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-08
Updated: 2019-02-08
Packaged: 2019-03-28 17:32:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 37,897
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13908861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alps_Sarsis/pseuds/Alps_Sarsis
Summary: Sharla was awfully unkind to Vivienne Wilde, but the fox still chose to help her.  Why would she ever do that?The sheep will find out that the intent was not to provide an easy road to the answers she needed.  The anger of a mother fox is a terrible thing indeed.  What waits for Sharla may help her, or actually kill her.Viv was right about one thing, though.  This crazy badger might be the only one who can help the desperate, terrified ewe.





	1. Honey

 

****Sheepless in New Reynard** **

_ _Chapter 1:  Honey_ _

 

 

 

 

Stupid, worthless, conniving, lying, egotistical, smug, cheating, ignorant foxes.

 

__BAM, BAM, BAM!_ _

 

Brutish, dull, arrogant, selfish, greedy, thoughtless, cruel, careless vulpines!

 

__BAM, BAM, BAM, BAM!_ _

 

Sharla wiped her face in her sleeve as she panted in frustration in a bathroom stall made for mammals up to five times her size.  She wasn’t big, even for a sheep.  Her black wool was neatly tended to make her look even smaller and more demure.  It gave her a professional appeal, and made her less imposing to the children that she taught.  Most of them were smaller than sheep, so it was important not to be imposing or it would distract from the lesson.  The ewe sucked in a deep breath and wiped her eyes with her sleeve.  She was so angry that she’d been crying.  

 

Never had she known a depth of utter betrayal as sour and horrible as this.  Judy had been her best friend since before they were even teenagers.  How could she be so cruel?  Was this a joke to her?  Did she have any idea the pain her now __former__  friend was enduring?  Sharla angrily punched the metal wall of her stall again.  

 

Foxes.  It wasn’t Judy’s fault specifically.  It came back to those loathsome, petty, sneaky, thieving, shallow, crude, pointless, worthless foxes.  Sharla angrily exited the stall to put some water on her face.  She needed to get herself under control so she wasn’t a mess walking out of here.  The last thing she needed was for some judgmental PTA parent seeing her as an emotional wreck and spreading dumb rumors around town about her breaking up with someone or worse.  She needed to vent.  She vented.  Her close relationship with a thesaurus aside, it hadn’t really helped much.  

 

Her mood did not improve as she walked away from the stall.  Standing in the bathroom, probably actually waiting for her, was one of the foxes she’d just gotten done yelling at.  Nicely dressed and pretending to be some kind of elegant for a trip to town, the older female vulpine simple leaned back against the wall right beside the door exiting the facilities.

 

“Leave me alone.  Stop following me,” grumbled the black-toned ewe.

 

“Being mad at me won’t help your brother,” the older lady fox observed.  Sharla narrowed her eyes.  So freaking smug!  How dare she even bring Gareth up!  He was probably torn to shreds by a bunch of __her__ kind.  At least predators.  And truth be told, Judy and __her__  fox might well have been a large part responsible because they decided to delay the only help he might have had.  They wouldn’t help her.  They were relaxing on vacation and didn’t want to be involved.  It was a sheep problem.  Sharla saw it for what it was.

 

“Your best chance to help me in a meaningful way passed when you opted to __breed__ ,” the sheep responded.  The lady vulpine pinned her ears back.  Yeah, that got under her fur.  Predator moms could be super protective.  Sharla didn’t care.  Judy taught her long ago not to be afraid of preds.  Her lack of fear had worked for her up to this point.  This fox needed to respect this sheep, even if it meant Sharla needed to be uncharacteristically hostile.  Being hostile was easy for her now, as mad and hurt as she was.  It felt good to unload on this meddlesome mammal.

 

The vixen gazed away a moment, as if clearing her already empty head, and then staring back at the sheep.  “Be that as it may, I do have information to give to you so you can contact someone who __can__ help.  I can’t make you do anything, but I care about my family, and I know you care about yours.  Judy __wants__ to help, and this is how she thinks she can best do that.”  The lady fox held up the napkin that Judy had written whatever worthless pass-the-buck number she had thought of.

 

“Not interested.  My brother is not any of your concern now, Miss…?”

 

“Vivienne,” the fox reintroduced.

 

“Vivienne, I gotta know… Why Judy, huh?”  Sharla walked up to the fox, almost nose to nose with her.  Get in her face.  That’s what preds understand.  Verbally bite back.  That’s what they respect.  It’s all they know.  Do that and they back off.  “What could he possibly want with her?  Shouldn’t you be worried about that?”

 

“He loves her.  Why should that worry me?”  Viv appeared unfazed.

 

“But why?  Why a bunny?  Why might he prefer someone suspiciously the size of… oh… a very, very young fox?”  Sharla crossed her arms, inwardly blanching at herself.  Okay, so that was actually low, even for her.  That was her rage speaking.  She sucked in a breath and tried to calm herself down. This was about to end up being a real fight.  Sharla was way too angry and she needed to calm down.  Vivienne, however, looked stoic.

 

“You don’t know him… that’s plain to see,” she expressed calmly, though her ears were tight to her head and her lips were pulled up enough to show her teeth a bit as she spoke, “but I’m sure you watch the news, given that you’re a teacher.  You know what Judy did for him.  That’s not an isolated incident in their relationship.  She’s been the absolute best thing that’s ever __happened__ to my son, and I would honestly be far more concerned about him if he __hadn’t__  fallen in love with her.”

 

Sharla glared at the too-good vixen.  She wanted to wipe that self-assured, calm, controlled, blank expression off her pointy fox face.  This fox had no idea what she and Judy had gone through when they were younger.  The sheep spoke in a venomous, low tone.  “You know she was attacked by a fox when she was little right?  Tore her open, right in front of me.  So you __must__ understand why it’s so easy for me to tell she’s being abused.  I’m worried about her.”  That mess with Gideon was not something she was ever going to forget or forgive.  There was blood all over her little friend’s face, the ground, her paws… Sharla had nightmares for weeks after that.  Hell, she nearly ended up going to therapy.  She figured Judy must have, but the doe never said anything about it.  She was too proud.

 

Viv took a slow, deep breath and leaned back against the wall heavily again.  “And Judy grew past that, Sharla.  I’m a lot more worried that __you__ have not.  You’re a __teacher__ , for crying out loud.  You sound like you just hate all foxes for that.  That’s juvenile!  Don’t you have to teach fox kits in your class?  How do you feel about them?” she asked.

 

Sharla jerked at that.  Oh hell no.  This stupid, self-important, pretentious __fox__  was not standing there criticizing her ability to __teach__  the second grade.  She was an award-winning teacher!  She boasted the highest test-scoring class for two years running!  If wool could bristle, Sharla was the rough side of Velcro.  That was the last straw.  She did not ask to be accosted and judged in a public freaking bathroom by this over-blown helicopter parent!

 

The sheep growled out with disgust, intent only on lashing out at this meddling vulpine.  “I do have to teach them, yes.  And it’s hard.  I have to struggle to cram some kind of usable something into their boggled little minds before I unleash them onto the next grade.  I do my best but I still feel like I’m serving mud pies to my biggest critic.  For as hard as it must be for Judy as the first bunny cop, fighting bears and blowing open scandals bigger than the whole city, I promise it’s far harder to teach a fox kit fractions.”

 

Sharla had to force down her grin.  The look on Vivienne’s face was priceless.  She appeared absolutely sick from that.  What was she gonna do?  Hit a sheep in the bathroom?  Bite her?  Scratch her?  It would be sweet, sweet revenge to make Judy arrest her husband’s __(gag)__ mother.  It would honestly serve her right.  Sharla felt pain in her keratin-tipped fingers from how tight she’d been clenching up in her rage.

 

She watched the lady fox close her eyes a moment, to compose herself, and speak again.  “I know how angry you are, Sharla.  You would be a pretty miserable teacher if you were unfair to your students.  I don’t think that’s true.  Let it go a moment and let me help you.”  Sharla put her velvety black ears back.  This one was pretty refined for a fox.  Fine.  She would just push her harder.  She wasn’t gonna get to leave thinking she somehow won the day for her cowardly son and his brainwashed bunny.  

 

The sheep took a determined step forward and practically growled out, “The foxes I get aren’t students, Vivienne.  They aren’t there to learn.  They are there because they legally have to be.  My only duty to them is to keep them from biting each other.  If they can learn that, they’ll have an easier time in prison later.  Compliance is all they can __hope__ to learn, and that’s only gotten __harder__ to do because after Bellwether got removed they stopped letting us use __muzzles__ on them.”

 

A wave of ice cold seemed to cut through the whole room.  Sharla took two nearly panicked steps back away from Vivienne as her emerald eyes changed in an instant.  A keen, narrow, piercing gaze locked on the sheep’s throat.  Sharla had seen angry mammals before, but this was completely different.  The sheep’s back hit the stall she’d exited a moment ago.  She wanted to get a rise out of Vivienne, but those were the eyes of a killer.  Sharla felt immobile.  She felt like she couldn’t breathe just from how that fox was glaring at her.  She wasn’t about to be just slapped or clawed or bitten.  Looking at this mother’s fury, she stared for the first time into her own agonized oblivion.

 

Sharla went too far.  She didn’t actually feel that way about __any__ of her students. Not one single kit or cub, fox or bunny, sheep or wolf she’d ever taught had ever really been treated unfairly that she could think of.  She was just trying to wind up a stupid fox.  This was so stupid. She knew preds were protective.  What the hell had she been thinking?  For a brief second, as those gleaming sharp teeth bared themselves in sickening viciousness, Sharla the sheep knew how she was going to die.  All she could think in that sad, awful moment was:

 

__Please… not in a public restroom._ _

 

But the teeth vanished, Vivienne’s expression falling as she sighed.  She leaned back against the wall again and crossed her arms in front of her, as if willing her claws into hiding.

 

Sharla spoke shakily.  “I… I’m gonna leave.”  She meant it.  She’d go straight home and deadbolt the door and stay there until she knew that fox was back in Zootopia or wherever she lived.

 

“Wait…” Viv commanded in a dark tone.  Sharla felt nausea rush through her.  This was it.  She was trapped.

 

“You can’t hold me here against my will,” Sharla murmured, her voice betraying her.  It wavered.  She was literally shaking.  She couldn’t help it.  

 

“I’m gonna… make you a deal,” Vivienne announced in a slow, measured tone.  The way she said it made the sheep think that this deal was the only way out of that bathroom alive.

 

“What kind of deal?” Sharla whispered.

 

“Judy’s contact… won’t be able to help you. We both __know__ that.  While you either don’t believe it, or don’t care, Judy can’t help you because of how the rules for the police force work. Personal involvement… all that mess.”

 

“Duh.  It’s why I said don’t bother,” grumbled the sheep.  She didn’t want any deals, she just wanted to leave.

 

“It’s a pain.  But she can’t help that.  However… I happen to know someone who absolutely __can__  help you.”

 

“Why would __you__ help me?” interrogated the ewe.  She then crossed her arms in front of her chest.  She needed to stop being stubborn and get out of this bathroom.

 

“I personally wouldn’t help you out of a burning hole if I owned a ladder factory right now.  My deal...  I help you in a meaningful way to resolve the mystery of your missing sibling… and you never, ever get near my son or his __wife__  ever again.  I mean it.  You don’t come in barking distance of them.  You assure me of this, and I __will__ help you.”  Sharla widened her eyes at that statement.  The vixen sounded dead serious.  Could she actually know something?  She sounded really genuine.

 

“What makes you think your contact can help me?” inquired Sharla.

 

Vivienne glared at the black sheep, those icy verdant eyes still gripping the ewe’s soft, slight form like invisible claws.  If the sheep were not otherwise highly educated she would have had all kinds of superstitious worries in the moment.  This mother fox was intense.  

 

Viv spoke again, slowly.  “You think that your brother’s disappearance has something to do with anti-sheep sentiment… You suspect folks who were keen on the conspiracy and maybe eager to strike back… right?”

 

“I said that much,” Sharla murmured.

 

“I know someone who was perhaps the most deeply involved in uncovering that conspiracy.  Long before any of the stuff you saw on the news came to light, she knew __all__ of it.  She runs an unassuming Bed and Breakfast in New Reynard.  No one, and I mean no one knows more about the conspiracy, and those who sought to end it, than her.  Her name is Honey.  If anyone out there has mentioned __anything__  about your brother, good or bad, she’ll have heard about it.”  Sharla stared at the fox, wide-eyed.  That sounded like exactly the kind of lead that she needed.  It wasn’t the safe do-nothing road that Judy suggested. This sounded like what her old bunny friend, the one that cared, would actually be doing.  Judy would go to this dangerous mammal and get answers.  It sounded like the real solution.

 

“Okay, that sounds… useful to me, but how do I get her to help me?  I’m a sheep.”

 

“A good question. She doesn’t trust easily.  You have to go in person, and you have to tell her that Vivienne sent you.  Tell her that Vivienne says you could use an arrow to point you in the right direction.  She’ll take care of you.  I promise.”  Those words were still calm, slow, and careful.  They were also very __final__.  The fox turned abruptly and left the ladies room. The place seemed to depressurize with her, making it feel as if the lights themselves had even dimmed in her presence.  Sharla had to remind herself that it was how adrenaline affected her eyes.  Still, while a moment ago all Sharla could think of was getting out of that bathroom, she simply turned around and went right back into the stall she’d just been in, needing it more than she had ever needed one.

 

 

 *************

 

 

The train ride over was a lot shorter than Sharla had expected it would be.  That was largely because she was anxious the whole time, and dreading getting into New Reynard.  She knew nothing about that town other than its position on a map.  That was all she taught her students about it, certainly.  It was a little town, so its dot wasn’t one of the white circles, it was a little black point.  That meant less than five thousand mammals lived and worked there.  It would be quiet and out of the way, and there was apparently a mammal living there who was not what she seemed to be.  She ran a Bed and Breakfast, but she apparently had something else pretty serious and secret going on.

 

The ride gave Sharla a chance to reflect on the conversation itself.  She was more and more unhappy about what she had said, not so much who she said them to.  She didn’t care how bad she upset that fox, Viv put herself in that position by following her into the bathroom knowing how pissed off she’d been.  But she genuinely regretted some of the things she said.  

 

She shouldn’t have brought her students into it.  How could she have ever been so angry as that?  She gave up a chance at being an astronaut to teach because she really felt like the difference between a ditch-digger and a moon walker was the support a kit got while they were young.  Hell, the sharpest kit in her class was actually Marcus, a little grey fox.  She was so out of line for saying that, but that’s how furious she had been.

 

It was the stress.  It was making her sick.  She wasn’t sleeping.  She ate poorly, and if she drank, half the time it was something you had to be an adult to even buy.  Winter break was almost over and she hadn’t even given the principle a direct answer on when she was coming back.  Her life was completely off the rails.  She just wanted resolution.  She wanted to find her brother or at least say goodbye.  This mess about missing him and not knowing was so cruel.

 

And she was reminded in that moment that she had lost a friend over it, and what was worse, this friend actually did know, at least to some extent, the poison Sharla was suffering from.  Vivienne was right.  The ewe did watch the news.  Nick was lost.  The city said he died.  The bunny didn’t stop looking.

 

She traded repairing that friendship for this favor, this chance to find her brother.  Maybe she could still send a letter or something, and explain herself, but for now, what lie ahead was much, much more frightening.  It was a dark, bleak, impossible unknown.  She was going to visit a stranger to ask them to help her, and had no idea why they even should.

 

As the sheep dreaded this fated meeting, she saw the trees thicken around her.  It was the middle of winter and all the leaves were gone.  It gave an eerie, quiet, deathly feel to the ride into this unknown place.  It did not help Sharla feel any less of that sense of foreboding when the train pulled up to a platform surrounded by nothing but quiet forest.  

 

“Oh God, really?” she whispered to herself.  It was already starting to get dark.  What was she supposed to do, wait for a bus?  It didn’t feel like a bus kind of town.  She got off the train and onto the platform.  There was a little black and white stenciled map on a post that showed the way to town.  She didn’t really need it.  It was the lonely, dark road that lead further away from Zootopia, and deeper into the forest.  The sheep rubbed all the way down her face and glanced back at the train. She could just get back on it and go home.  There was that.

 

No.  This was for her brother.  Even if it was too late for him, how would he feel on the other side, knowing his sister gave up because she was afraid of a spooky forest?  After what he’d probably endured in his final moments… No.  She would know what happened.  She would lay him to rest.  And those responsible would be brought to justice, if any could be had.  This was personal.  With that grim sense of determination, she turned and began to stalk down the road.

 

No cars.  Not one single car drove past her.  It was cold and quiet, and occasionally a pine cone or a limb would fall in the skeletal forest and shuffle the thick leaf-litter of the post-Autumnal ground, startling her terribly.  As she arrived at the edge of New Reynard, there were still no cars driving about.  There were some at a diner that she passed, but as the sun sank below the horizon it appeared nearly everyone was in for the night.  Except for a black sheep wandering through town, being all strange and suspicious, of course.  She quickened her pace.

 

This town needed a bus.  It was a long enough walk just to get to the town itself.  She had no idea where to look for this Bed and Breakfast, so she needed to ask someone.  She moved toward the park.  There were a few mammals milling around, talking, holding cups of coffee, sitting on benches.  The first one she came toward was a fox, so she wrote that off immediately.  She went another way, and saw a jogger approaching.  Perking up, she prepared to petition for some help finding the place, but then saw that one was a fox too.  Okay, she would keep searching.  Another fox.  Then another.  And another.

 

No.  No, no, no.  What the hell was this?  Was everyone in town a fox?  Sharla thought about the train.  It had to have left already.  Maybe that was even the last one for the day.  She couldn’t be stuck in this place.  Was Honey a fox?  She hadn’t even asked!  He had been so afraid of Vivienne at the time she told her about this place that it hadn’t even mattered then.  It sure as heck mattered now!  That sinking sensation became too powerful, and Sharla sat down on a bench with a thump.

 

This was a disaster.  Was Vivienne just messing with her?  How could she have not thought to do any kind of asking around or research first?  Now she was stuck in fox-hell for who knew how long.

 

“Troubles tonight?” came a scratchy voice beside her.  Sharla yelped and cast her lithe, graceful form comically onto the grass, having just flung herself out of the bench in alarm.  Had there always been an old, silvering, fragile-looking fox there on the bench?  When the hell had he sat down if he hadn’t been?  Had she really just not noticed him there?

 

“Geeze, don’t __do__  that!  You scared me half to death!” the sheep cried, clutching her chest, her black blouse doing little to soften the hammering of her heart under her palm.

 

“Beggin’ forgiveness m’ dear, you certainly didn’t look like ye’ had a whole half left as’n it were.  Yer lost, maybe?” He held a cane in both his gnarled paws, that cream-colored suit pressed and neat.  Sharla relaxed.  She could literally probably crawl faster than this ancient predator could chase after her.

 

“Yeah, I am.  I’m trying to find the Bed and Breakfast here in town.  I’m looking for someone named Honey.”  This old creature seemed like he would have known every stone in that town.  As much as Sharla didn’t want to talk to a fox, he felt both harmless and wise.  It was likely the best chance she had of still succeeding in her little mission here.

 

His response was unexpected.  Laughter.  He laughed so hard that he started coughing.  He nearly went to his knees from the coughing, laughing, then coughing some more.  It was a rattling, terrible, fox-on-his-way-out cough.  Sharla jumped up and glanced around fearfully.  She was going to need to call for help!  This was about to be a serious medical emergency.  Finally, however, wheezing and catching his breath, he stopped.  He was quiet after a bit.

 

“Was it… some kind of joke?  Have I been __pranked__ into coming all the way out here?!  God, there’s no Honey, is there?” she groaned.  Of course she would.  That stupid vixen made a fool of her.  She used the terrible tragedy of the sheep’s missing, maybe dead brother to trick her into buying a ticket to fox-ville and she was probably laughing herself half to death like this old thing.

 

That rattling voice took the sheep’s attention off of her rekindled rage.  “I kin tell yer serious about why yer here.  There’s definitely a Honey here, lady ewe.  But who in all tarnation woulda sent yew out here to speak with her?”

 

“A fox,” grumbled Sharla, softening a little.  Okay, so at least Honey was real, but what was so funny?

 

“Which one?” asked the elder vulpine.

 

“Vivienne Wilde.  She said Honey was the one who could help me.”  The jovial, tickled expression melted in an instant.  He appeared suddenly very serious.

 

“Viv’s the one what sentche?” he inquired, narrowing his eyes as he stared at the sheep.

 

“Yeah.  Mother of Nick the bunny-loving fox?” she implied.  She didn’t care if they wanted that to be common knowledge.  They certainly proclaimed it loud enough at the restaurant.

 

“Follow this road out of town opposite the train depot.”  The fox pointed a skin-and-bones claw out past the graveyard.  “Yer gonna see a road that shoots off t’ the right, says no outlet.  Follow that road there.  At the end of that yer gonna see a big house.  That’s it.  That’s the Bed and Breakfast.  If Vivienne says that’s where ye gotta go, you better git on over there.”  He was very resolute in how he stated that.  Sharla dusted herself off.

 

“Okay. Yes.  I do need to get there.  It’s late.  I’m late.  I… Thank you, mister,” the sheep stammered.  He was helpful, but something about even using Vivienne’s name seemed to almost frighten him.  What kind of mammal was that vixen?

 

“Elliott,” he replied.

 

“Pardon?” asked Sharla, pulled from her thoughts.

 

“Name’s Elliott.  Enjoy your stay here, if ye can.  I know yew got yer own problems and I bet they’re somethin’ big, but New Reynard’s a helpful place.  I have a bit of advice though…”

 

“Yes?”

 

“When yew see Honey, you tell her who sentche right away.  Don’t tarry about.  Don’t delay.  Yew tell ‘er.  It’ll make things loads easier for ye.”  His choice of language sounded very meticulous.

 

“They’re friends?” inquired the sheep.  

 

“Vivienne’s a hero in that house.”  With that, the elder fox got up shakily and began to shuffle off.  Sharla peered in the direction indicated.  Shops, a courthouse and what looked like a school… the largest buildings in town were all closed and quiet already.  No need to stay open in such a tiny place.  It was charming in its own way.  Too bad it had to be full of vulpines.  The ewe turned back to thank the nearly-dead fox, but gasped as she found herself completely alone in the park.  No one was there.  She spun around with some alarm.

 

She was absolutely alone.

 

While some lights were visible in windows and such, not a single other mammal was out.  That jammed a spike of fear through her soul hard.  While it should have delighted her to see that all the foxes were gone, it had happened so suddenly and so eerily that it unnerved her down to her very last nerve.  She took to the sidewalk hastily and made for the Bed and Breakfast.  She regarded the statue of the fox in the middle of town.  She knew who that was supposed to be, and it only solidified the fact that this was a majority fox settlement.  She knew about segregated communities, but she didn’t know this one existed.  It was pretty small though.  It wasn’t like Fenrir or Gruffbridge.  This place barely looked like it should have been self-sustaining.  

 

She followed the road out of town as the sun disappeared, leaving her walking alone in a forest in the middle of nowhere.  She didn’t like this.  The adrenalin was making her see things.  Hear things.  It felt like someone was following her.  It then felt like someone was waiting for her up the road where the next bend happened.  She imagined a band of foxes with knives just hanging out behind the next overly large, old-looking naked winter tree.  That was silly, however.  She was literally the only one on the roads.  What kind of thief sat and waited on a road no one was travelling on?  There was little use.  

 

Without incident, she took the intended right turn, and then about a mile and a half up that road, as the winter chill really began cutting through her neatly trimmed wool, particularly over where she left her skin nearly bare, she made it to the huge house in the forest.  It was pretty nice, all things considered.  It even had a new coat of paint.  

 

Willfully, she walked up to the door and tapped on it pretty loudly.  She knew it was a large house, and she figured if the occupant was upstairs or something they might not hear it.  There was a good pause as the sheep sat there waiting.  She couldn’t hear anything.  She knocked again.  Then again.  Surely a Bed and Breakfast had someone working at it.

 

Finally, just as the dejected sheep turned to leave and head back into the forest with no where to go or stay, the door opened.

 

What Sharla saw as she turned was as far from expected as it could possibly be.  Instead of a roughly similar-sized fox in the doorway there was a massive lady hyena.

 

“Welcome.  How can we be helping you?” she queried in a heavy Interiors accent.  This house suddenly had a much more forbidden and ominous feel to it.  

 

“I… I’ve come to see Honey.  I need help, and I was told she was the only one who could help me.  I’m trying to find someone who is missing.”  The large, strong-looking mammal regarded the sheep before her quietly a moment, frowning.  Her hulking form was clad in a tight fitting black short sleeve shirt and heavy dark cargo pants.  She felt like a bouncer for a club, not someone running a sweet, small-town bed and breakfast.

 

“Honey is running Bed and Breakfast.  You need Sungura ya Shetani, it sounds more like.  She is not being here.  You are told Honey can help though?  I let her know.  She will maybe say yes.”  The hyena stepped back, and Sharla moved to step inside, but the door was closed right in her face.  

 

Okay, so she would just wait out there on the big wrap-around porch.  It was a while, actually.  The sheep sat down on the porch swing.  Why did that look familiar?  She could swear she’d seen a picture of it somewhere recently.  It was odd.  What was a Sungura ya Shetani?  Where was she supposed to get one?  Was it a weird talisman for finding lost mammals, she wondered?  It sounded magical.  The mammals in The Interior were often superstitious.  The science-minded sheep wanted none of that, thank you.

 

The door finally opened again, and the hyena stepped outside.  She fixed her eyes on the sheep and said in a casual tone, “Honey asks what is your business here?”  Sharla tensed up a bit, not getting off the porch swing.  Viv was not kidding.  Whoever this mammal was, they were not the trusting sort.  It felt like she was trying to get information from a crime boss or something.

 

“Tell her Vivienne Wilde sent me.”  There was an audible gasp from the hyena.  Okay, it was bordering on scary at this point.  What was that friendship-wrecking fox’s mother’s significance in this town, anyway.  That was the second powerful reaction just using her name had gotten.  The sheep added, with a sense of importance.  “Tell Honey that Vivienne said I needed an arrow to point the way for me.”  There was a stunned expression on the hyena’s face, and she turned rather robotically and went inside, slamming and dead-bolting the door.  That wasn’t a great sign.  

 

A lot longer time passed, and Sharla found herself shivering on the porch.  Why did this have to be so hard?  Why couldn’t it have been just a little private eye office and she goes in and offers money and they take care of her problem?  Why did it have to feel like she was in some weird spy movie all of a sudden?  There were weird, foreign characters, a spooky caricature of a town, vanishing mammals, a vixen who had a strange link to seemingly everyone here, and a faceless, mysterious Honey who might be the only solution to her problem.

 

For as unsettling as everything was, it was so over the top that it was hard to deny how much it felt like this was the real deal.  There was something here.  Something was going to happen.  The door finally opened again, after what felt like twenty minutes.

 

“Honey will see you, lady ewe,” informed the hyena.

 

“I’m Sharla,” the sheep introduced.

 

“Motti,” returned the hyena.

 

“You work here?” pressed Sharla.

 

“I help to run this place, yes.  It is better place for Motti.”  She lead the black ewe down the hall, then up a flight of stairs, and then pushed on the wall.

 

The wall opened up.  Sharla felt that wave of fear-nausea again.  Hell no.  Secret passages.  This was absolutely __not__ real.  She was in a nightmare.  She was asleep on the train, or maybe she was, that very moment, lying on a public bathroom floor, slowly bleeding out.  Nothing was this crazy and weird all at once.  They went through a very dark hall for a few meters before Motti opened a regular wooden door.  Blue-grey light, like one saw from a television set, spilled out.

 

“In here.  Honey will speak to you in here.”  The hyena indicated the room.

 

“Th-thank you.”  The sheep moved to the door and turned, stepping inside.  She held her breath.  The door was closed behind her.  She swore she heard it latch, but her focus was more on the contents of this room.  Dozens of monitors lined the back wall of this room.  Cameras were all over the property.  Hell, they might have been all over that little town.  Was it even a real town?  Was Honey running some secret thing out here at the end of the line for the trains from Zootopia.  Oh, steaming chips, what had Sharla been led into?

 

“H… Hello?” she asked nervously, unable to restrain the slight bleat in her voice.  There was a huge swivel chair with its back to the door.  She saw a dark claws paw resting on the arm of it.  Someone was there, watching.  Always watching.  Oh God, that made it feel so much more like something out of a horror movie.  This was the watcher.  The one who knew.  This was who she was sent to see and nothing had ever felt more real and terrifying in her life.  Slowly the chair turned.

 

It wasn’t a fox.  Sitting in it was a badger.  She fixed narrow, hateful eyes upon the sheep who stood alone in the room with her.  She drummed her claw tips on the arm of the chair, peering intently at her guest.  The badger wore dark jeans and a plaid shirt, looking as if she should be out cutting trees down.  

 

“I… I came for help,” explained the sheep.  State her business.  That was the right thing to do.

 

The badger responded in a low, dark tone.  “I want you t’ answer my next question real honestly, caprid…”  The way she practically spat it felt like how Sharla said ‘fox’.  

 

“Of course,” Sharla replied.  It was hard to get over the place.  Those monitors.  The security.  How the town reacted to her.  How the town reacted to Vivienne’s name.  This was it.  She was in it.  If there was an answer, nothing had ever felt more like the right direction than this.  Sharla held her breath, waiting for her question.  This would qualify her for the help she was requesting, perhaps.  She would tell them anything if it meant she could find out what happened to Gareth.  He deserved that.  She would never see Judy again, that was true too.  She agreed if she got real help then that chapter of her life was absolutely over.  However, for Gareth, she would do it.  Heck, she hardly talked to Judy any these days anyway.

 

She was pulled from her thoughts as the ominous beast before her spoke again.  “I want you to tell me…” The lady badger leaned back and picked up a long object of some kind from under the desk behind her.  She then slowly, in a calm and fluid motion unsheathed a medieval-looking, gleaming, obviously real sword, rising to her feet.

 

“Oh, God…” Sharla bleated.  She put her hoof on the door behind her.  The latch didn’t budge.  Locked.  She was locked in!  No!

 

“... Now, sate my curiosity, if you will, and __tell me__ …  What did you __do__ to Vivienne Wilde to make her want you this  _dead?_ ”


	2. Memories

 

****Sheepless in New Reynard** **

_ _Chapter 2:  Memories_ _

 

 

 

 

There was blood.  There was so much.  It mixed with the dusty tan farm soil.  It had been a dry few days, but there was still enough that it stayed wet.  Sharla felt ill.  She did nothing.  She didn’t so much as yell at Gideon for doing it.  She just watched as he held the little bunny down and ripped half her face off.  That’s what it looked like anyway.  Bunny faces were small, and it didn’t take a lot of blood to seem like a lot, but that was a lot.

 

“Someone get the constable!  He won’t see the light of day again!  I want him tied up and locked away!” boomed the uncharacteristically furious voice of a normally mild Stu Hopps.

 

“Oh Stu, they’re the same age for cryin’ out loud!  Stop it, you’re scaring her worse!” Bonnie injected the voice of reason.

 

“Hello, not scared?” Judy waved at her parents with one paw while holding her fathers pawkerchief loosely to her cheek.  Pressure was supposed to stop the bleeding, but Sharla was on the same page with her little friend.  The proud and emotional buck blew his nose into that thing at the beginning of Judy’s stage play.  Ick.

 

“Come on, Judy, let’s get you to a doctor.  You need stitches.”

 

“Dad!  It’s fine!”

 

“It’ll scar!” Stu fired back.

 

“Maybe, but scars are pretty cool!”

 

Her mother knelt down where she was sitting under the tree that everyone else had been shamefully hiding behind.  “Judy, do you want to have to explain that scar to a boyfriend or something one day?”  Sharla sucked in a breath, tears welling up.  She should have just thrown down the tickets and ran!  Why didn’t she do that?  Judy was scarred for life!

 

“Mom!” Judy pushed the pawkerchief back in the matronly doe’s paw, “No one cares if I got in a fight.  It’s gonna heal and no one’s gonna care.  We don’t gotta make a fuss, I handled it.”

 

“Oh, you handled it alright, missy.  You ran off while we were talking to you and immediately got into a fight!  That’s how you handled it!  That’s trouble for everyone!”

 

“Yes, Gideon Grey, uh huh!  They live at the edge of town.”  Sharla glanced back in the direction of Judy’s dad.  He was talking to one of the deputies who was attending the fair off duty.

 

“Come on, we need to at least get this cleaned up with something other than a pawkerchief,” Bonnie ordered.

 

“Mom,” Judy pressed.

 

“Now.”  The finality of that got the obstinate kit on her feet and then in seconds it was like nothing ever happened there in that vacant lot.

 

Except the blood.  There was the blood.  That horrible animal attacked a harmless little bunny to make a point.  He was stronger.  She was weaker.  That’s really how his kind thought.  He said it himself.  The killer instinct is there.  In a million years it would never be fully bred out of them.  She heard sniffling.

 

Her brother.  In everything, she’d almost forgotten about him.  He seemed fine!

 

She found him behind the same tree they had cowered behind.

 

“G-Gareth?” Sharla announced, as he hadn’t seen her yet.  He gasped a little, and wiped his eyes with his woolly arm as if to pretend he hadn’t been caught crying.  He had congratulated Judy on getting their tickets.  He told her she was awesome.  He looked fine.  Why was he crying now?  It was over.

 

“Do you think she’s gonna have a big scar, like they were talkin’ about?  I mean, it looked bad.  Is she gonna look messed up now?” he asked.

 

The black lamb tried to reassure her brother.  “Hey, no… I mean, they will get her treated and I bet she’ll look fine.  Scars are kinda grey, and her fur is grey.  I bet you’d have to be real close to… you know.. notice them.”

 

“I feel like I shoulda rammed him or something.  Got him off her before he could scratch her.  I was so scared.”

 

“We all were.  Gideon’s mean!” his sister protested.  That wasn’t his fault!  And besides, if it was, it was her fault too!  She didn’t want to think like that.

 

Gareth took a trembling breath.  That was it.  The adrenaline or whatever it was called was wearing off.  He was scared now.  He clutched his lucky shamrock hat.  Lot of good it did him today.  Though, it had certainly been lucky for their possession of their stupid tickets that Judy showed up.  It just wasn’t so fortunate for Judy.  There was a bit of quiet as he just stared at the ground.

 

“Judy’s strong,” Sharla insisted.  “Stronger than any of us.  She’s gonna be a cop one day, you heard her.”

 

“Yeah, well… maybe I’m not gonna be a cop or nothin… but I’m not gonna be scared next time.”

 

“We ain’t gettin’ into a fight next time either.  Gideon’s probably gonna go to jail forever.  You heard Mister Hopps tellin’ the others.”

 

“I mean ever.  I’m gonna know to make the right choice, even if it’s scary.  I’m not gonna let someone get hurt like that if I can stop it.  I can’t.  I can’t.”  He pulled his knees up and put his head on them, hugging his legs.

 

“It’s gonna be alright, Gareth.  I promise.  Judy’s fine.”

 

“I ain’t.” the pale lamb whispered despondently.  “I didn’t even blink.  I watched.  I just… watched.  I can’t stop seeing how… how it flung out.  On the ground.

 

“Stop!  I don’t wanna hear that!” Sharla shouted.

 

“I cain’t just stop, Sharla!  Yew saw it too!”

 

“No I didn’t, I covered my durn eyes!  C’mon, let’s go home.”

 

“I don’t wanna go home,” Gareth grumbled.  “Judy got tore up so we could keep havin’ fun at the fair.”  Sharla fumed.  She needed someone to talk to!  She didn’t want to be alone after something like that!

 

“Well, here’s your dumb tickets then.  I can’t even think about the stupid fair!” Sharla snapped.  If her brother wanted to be dumb he could be dumb without her!  She was going home.  She gave Gareth his half of the tickets, pivoted on her little hoof and away she went.

 

She would check on Judy once she got done getting cleaned up.  She could just walk to the Hopps farm.  After that, she bet Judy could use someone to talk to and play with too.  Sharla would swear to be her friend forever.  If Judy was gonna have to walk around with a totally wrecked face, there was no way that was going to mean she was friendless.  Not ever.

 

“Judy, I promise,” Sharla swore as she stalked away in the late afternoon heat.

 

 

 *************

 

 

“... definitely not an assassin.  If she was, dang she’d be the worst.”  That female voice was familiar.  The ewe’s eyes shot open.  Hovering over her, looking directly down at her where she lay on a couch, was a hyena.  Motti.  It had not been Motti’s voice she heard though.

 

Badger with a sword.  There was a badger, and she had a sword, and she was going to kill her!  Sharla sat up, feeling dizzy and cold and clammy.  She was in a living room, presumably at the bed and breakfast.  She had been covered by a quilt.  The room was kind of dark, save for the blue light coming from the media menu on the large flat-screen TV.

 

“Don’t kill me!” she bleated immediately.

 

“Suffice it to say, I stopped regarding you as a threat about ten minutes ago when you turned to over-cooked spaghetti at the sight of a blade.”  Sharla snapped her attention over to the hyena.  She was sitting in a chair off to the other side.  The ewe’s eyes immediately tracked back to another form between where Motti was and where Honey was, however.

 

There was a sheep with glasses hanging from the rafters by a chain.  

 

__BLEAT!_ _

 

The volume and harshness of Sharla’s scream made the hyena jump back.

 

“It’s a punching bag, holy hell!”  Honey burst into a fit of laughter.  “You’re a real flake, you know that?  So… I’m still wanting an answer to my question.  What made Vivienne send you here?”

 

“Geeze!  You guys are psychos!” cried the shaking sheep.  She felt dizzy again.

 

“No, no!  Stay sitting up.  Shake your head and … hoof… things.”  Honey shook her paws to indicate.  Sharla did that.

 

“She said she was helping me.  I asked my friend Judy for help and she refused!  She don’t want anything to do with a sheep.  No one does right now.”

 

“Shetani!” Motti gasped.  The sheep still had no idea what that was about.  Was it some kind of insult?

 

“Why didn’t Judy want to help you?” interrogated Honey calmly.  A wave of irritation swept through the exhausted, terrified, bitter ewe.  That dream.  She promised herself she would be Judy’s friend forever, and that wasn’t enough to even ask for help when her own brother might be dead.  

 

Sharla sat up straighter and spat out, “I don’t even know.  Okay?  I don’t know what happened.  She went from caring about justice and helping other mammals to being a self-centered little predophile freak.”

 

The sheep never even saw an expression change.  With no warning, Motti spun her upper body around and punched the hanging sheep.

 

Sharla might understand anger or intimidation being used and punching a weird effigy could achieve that, but nothing prepared her educated mind for seeing a mammal hit a heavy sand-filled bag so hard that it snapped the heavy-gauge chain it was hanging from and into the corner so hard that half the pictures and paintings on the wall fell to the floor with a crash.  Sharla had absolutely no idea why Motti even did that.

 

Even Honey flinched.

 

“Who is Judy to you again?” quetioned Honey, quickly recovering.Sharla’s ears were ringing and her head felt light.  She had nearly fainted again.  This was a nightmare reality.  What the hell was Judy and her dumb new fox family mixed up in?  Was this really just the bunny’s regular life?

 

“I am not meaning to break-” Motti attempted.

 

“Don’t worry about it, you will fix it later,” Honey expressed.

 

“Yes, Ma’am.”

 

Sharla collected herself enough to answer before she became the new effigy.  “I used to be her best friend, when she was a kit.  Hey, I’m just a teacher in Bunnyburrow.  I came here for help, but that dumb fox’s dumb fox mom set me up for… whatever this is.  I didn’t want any trouble, I just want to-”

 

“Dumb… fox mom?” interrupted Honey.

 

“That conniving vixen made me think she was helping me and sent me here for you to do __her__ freaking dirty work.”  Sharla pulled her legs under her, feeling violently bitter.  They got set up to do a crime that had nothing to do with them.  She wasn’t even really a threat, they informed her as such themselves.  If they thought this didn’t concern them, they should let her go.  But a fox sent her out here for this mess.

 

“We have to be getting dirty for work?” responded Motti.  

 

“How’s it feel to be used by a filthy, rutting vixen who thinks she’s too good to get her paws dirty?” the sheep practically bleated.  Vivienne teased her with the possibility of finding her brother but was just trying to get rid of her over a bunch of dumb insults!  Sharla grumbled, “…so she’s gonna make you do it.  To a freaking second grade teacher who just wanted someone to listen and help!”  She was near tears.  How could she be pushed into this nightmare after asking her __dearest__ friend for something so life-or-death?

 

Sharla suddenly sank back into the couch, as if it could protect her.  Wow, hyenas had a lot of teeth.  And they were honestly the most terrifying teeth she’d ever seen.  And she saw a lot of them.  Motti was showing them to her.

 

Honey said nothing, just picking up a remote and clicking ‘play’.

 

“This is confidential.” she stated casually.

 

It was a section of forest.  Oh, a sheep showed up.  Wait.  Why would Honey be showing her this?  Was something going to happen to the sheep?  Oh god, it was intimidation, something was gonna happen to the sheep.  What was that in his hooves?

 

A spear.  That was unexpected.  He was dragging a pig with him.

 

Wait, that pig was on the news.

 

Sharla squinted.  “Is that…?”

 

“Shhh.”  She was shushed by a hyena.

 

This began to feel like something different.  The sheep strong-armed the pig down pretty brutally, and then tied her hooves with rope, and then staked the rope down with her splayed out like some savage sacrifice.

 

Sheep were doing this.  Not foxes.  Not wolves.  Sheep.  It immediately turned Sharla’s stomach.  They were showing her justification for their actions to her.

 

“This is on your property?” she asked, remembering how the scenes on the cameras she saw upstairs looked.

 

“Camera 6,” announced Honey without answering the question.  The camera changed.  It was a little ridge in the woods near where the pig was.  It was Nick and Judy.  Both scenes were shown side by side.

 

“Oh my god, what’s she wearing?  Is this from the 80’s?” she murmured.

 

“Last fall.” Motti responded, then shushed __herself.__

__

“I can’t hear anything anyway,” Sharla observed.

 

“No audio.  I’ll translate.  The sheep’s a paid assassin.  They were gonna chuck knockout gas into the inn here, then burn it down with everyone inside.  Fortunately, I spotted them first.  Thinking they missed out on taking out Nick, Judy, and the other survivors, they were gonna execute Porcintia.”

 

“I thought she was familiar…  So… You know that I have nothing to do with like… __any__  of that crap, right?  I mean, not every freaking sheep that existed was involved!”  She began to feel a sense of panic.  That’s what was going on.  Honey’s home was attacked by sheep involved in that Interior mess.  Holy crap, Vivienne was right.  Honey probably knew a ton about it, or they would __not__  have been attacking her Bed and Breakfast.

 

The other heavy truth that dawned on Sharla was that Honey was telling the absolute truth.  This was confidential.  Nothing about this was on the news.  Not yet.

 

“I know Porcintia survived, so I take it Judy creamed this guy?”  It was hard to hide the little bit of pride left in Sharla’s voice.  Judy was a heck of a fighter.

 

Motti responded as Nick and Judy obviously tried to delay the inevitable on camera 6. “She couldn’t.  Shetani was still recovering.”  Sharla paused at that.  Shetani was a nickname of some kind for Judy.  It was not just a passing familiarity.  These mammals knew her.  Maybe being the bunny’s friend would really help.  Or would have, before… everything.

 

“Camera 14.” introduced the badger.  A third scene popped into the lovingly crafted video.  A large white rock in the forest, wide and flat.  In a flash, a green-hooded figure popped into view on it.  Kneeling, they lifted their bow up and pulled back an arrow.  The camera suddenly, shakily zoomed in to see this new mammal.

 

Sharla recognized her immediately.

 

She could have been completely covered, not just in a hoody, but in a full suit of armor and the sheep would have known.

 

It was the eyes.  Those eyes were so sharp, keen, and malevolent.

 

“This is my favorite part,” whispered Honey.  

 

The sheep raised his horrible-looking spear to stab the bound, helpless pig, and the vixen released the arrow.

 

That was it.  Sharla knew then that she was dealing with someone who had willingly and easily spilled sheep’s blood.  The point had not been to make the ewe aware of what happened to trespassers.  It wasn’t to make her understand that Honey had a reason to think she needed to kill a sheep suddenly showing up at her home.  It was not to remind her that Nick and Judy were heroes who the angry sheep had just verbally smeared and called freaks.

 

It was to show her that Vivienne Wilde absolutely did not need someone else to do her dirty work.  Sharla felt a prickly dread that came with the realization that in a dozen alternate universes she died in a public bathroom.

 

And this mammal was involved, just like the vixen had promised.

 

Honey could help her.

 

But after all the crap Sharla just unloaded, there was absolutely no way that was going to happen.

 

“I’m sorry,” she bleated softly.  “I came searching for help, but my stupid mouth just cost me that.  I’m sorry.”  The ewe sniffled.  She had to get her anger in check, but everything made her furious.  All these chances to help Gareth, and no one was gonna do it.  And now it seemed even Sharla herself wasn’t gonna do it because she was letting her anger keep winning out.  She put her face in her hooves.

 

“Oh no, don’t do __that__.  Make her faint again, Motti,” Honey groaned.  The hyena glanced with uncertainty at the owner of the inn and made a pounding motion with her huge, meaty paw.  “Uh… no, I didn’t mean…”  Honey held her temples, standing up in front of their uninvited guest.  “Look, what am I even supposed to help you with?”  

 

“My brother.  He went missing after the Lanolin thing,” the ewe stated with a crack in her voice.  “I tried to get help, but the local Sheriff’s a ram, and he doesn’t want anything to do with helping someone who might have been involved.  It’s a damned election year.”

 

“You want to find a missing mammal,” reviewed Honey, “and the best mammal in the entire world that could find him is unable to help you because she’s directly involved with the case and it’s not allowed.”  Sharla gritted her flat sheep’s teeth tightly.  Okay, so that part of what Judy said might have not just been an excuse.  “Pretty terrible luck for your brother.  Even if it were allowed, last I heard, she’s not even been cleared from administrative duty because of her __injuries__.”

 

“Injuries?” interrupted Sharla.

 

“Your friend that you seem to have __such__ a high opinion of…” Honey ground in, “… was cut nearly in half while saving Motti’s family from really bad mammals in The Interior.”  The badger narrowed her eyes.  “And on that video, while she was held together by stitches and awesomeness, she ran her bunny bottom out into those woods to save __me__  while I stayed to help protect all the mammals your ‘friend’ already almost died to save.  But, yeah, she’s just… selfish and stupid.  That fits, doesn’t that fit, Motti?”

 

“No?” the hyena replied questioningly.

 

Yeah, this wasn’t going in a good direction.

 

“I didn’t know any of that, you guys.  That’s __not__ public knowledge.”

 

“Vivienne risked her life out there too.  So you probably understand… exactly how much incentive I got now t’ help you find anything but the train station.”

 

“Motti owes life to Shetani.  It is forever bond.  She is not your friend, then you is not our friend.”  The huge hyena crossed her arms.

 

“I __am__  her friend.  Or I was,” sighed the sheep dejectedly.  Yeah, she screwed literally everything up.  “I … had to promise Vivienne I wouldn’t talk to her again if she found someone to help me.”  After hearing about how wrong she was about Judy’s reasons for not helping, and how badly she’d treated the doe in public, she was really regretting that deal.  She wished she could at least apologize face to face, so Judy knew she really meant it.  Sharla messed up.  Judy didn’t deserve that.

 

“Wait…”  Honey leaned in.  She had been so angry that musk was practically boiling off of her.  Even Sharla’s nose was a bit overwhelmed.  “I help you… and Judy never has to deal with your bigot sheep butt again?”

 

“What?” responded Sharla as she drew away from the pungent scent with aggravation.  “I’m __not__ a bigot!  I’m upset, I’m tired, and I’m desperate.  Maybe I said stuff I regret in all that, but I don’t just… hate mammals to be hatin’ them.  I’m not like that!”  With her chances to find Gareth pretty much back to square zero, Sharla felt like her character was about all she was going to have left in all of this.  She might have been wrong in how she handled herself with Judy and Vivienne, but there was a reason!

 

“You called Judy a predophile freak.” reminded Honey.  “Like… that was something seriously terrible,” Honey reminded her.  Oh crap.

 

“I was upset!” shouted Sharla.  She then tried to reign herself in.  She did not want to appear threatening.  She had no idea where that sword was.

 

“Uh huh…”  Honey stood up and paced.  “Why not call her just… selfish?  Or say she was a cheater, or a backstabber?  You could have just said she was a terrible friend.”  Sharla’s heart plunged into her feet.  No.  No, she __wasn’t__ a bad mammal.  She wasn’t like __that__ _ _!__   She was just angry and wanted to say something hurtful.

 

About someone who wasn’t there to be hurt by it.

 

The sheep looked down in disgust at her own keratin-coated cloven fingers.  No.  She wasn’t.  But there was absolutely no argument against it.  She knew the definition by heart.  She could have chosen __anything__ to insult Judy, Nick, or Vivienne.  But the whole time, only one thing ever came up as an exploitable flaw.

 

Nick and Vivienne were foxes.

 

And that was not a flaw.

 

Sharla knew very little about Nick, but didn’t dislike him until it became clear that he was romantically involved with Judy, and it didn’t even blink into the sheep’s skull that Judy was happy.  He was a fox, and Judy was too good for him.

 

She never even asked herself how good Nick was.  She was too good because Nick was a __fox__.  There was absolutely no other reason.

 

Sharla felt sick, empty, and terrible.  She had never felt, even for __Gideon__ , the kind of revulsion that she had for herself in that moment.

 

“Oh, she didn’t know.  Oh dear.”  Honey sounded sincerely sympathetic, and in the sheep’s state, Sharla couldn’t tell if she was being absolutely smug about it.  If she was, she deserved it.

 

“She didn’t know,” Motti repeated, nodding.

 

“It’s hard.  I know what it’s like.” Honey sighed slowly.

 

“No.  You don’t.  You can’t know what this is like.”  Sharla couldn’t even flavor her words with inflection.  “I’m complete shit.”  She felt like she didn’t even deserve to see Judy again in the first place.  The bunny sure as hell got over hating foxes without justification.  Sharla suddenly represented the closed-mindedness and ugliness that she hoped all her students would be above.

 

“Yer a bigot, not a corpse,” the inn’s owner stated.  “You can get better, dummy.”

 

“What?”  Sharla gazed up kind of dizzily.  It completely derailed her.  Was this badger being nice to her now?  Why would she do that?

 

“Oh, my little ghost of mittens future…” she sat down heavily by Sharla, putting a heavy, meaty arm over her shoulder.  “I’m gonna confess something.  I don’t say this to jest anyone, hear?”  Motti nodded, as if understanding what this was about.  “I have been, in my past, where you are now.  Conflicted.  Scared.  I was seein’ a part of me I didn’t think was there.  But it was… like a big, fat, bloated tick no one was nice enough to tell me was on my face until the last day of the Arrow Jamboree.”

 

“Uh…” Sharla slowly leaned away.

 

“Anyway, it happened to me.  I discovered, to my disgust… I had not always been fair to sheep.”  Sharla’s eyes darter to the slumped, wool-lined bag of badly beaten sand.  She had discovered this a couple minutes ago, then?

 

“I’m not… I don’t __want__  to be… that.”  It was the most genuine Sharla thought she had ever been about anything.

 

“And boom, just like that, you ain’t a bad mammal.”  Honey slapped her on the back too hard.  “No, not really, yer still garbage.”

 

Sharla flinched.

 

“Are you… able to help me then?” she inquired warily.

 

“I’d sooner see you knitted to death by my NightHowlered granny, truth be told,” Honey stated.

 

“Ha!” beamed Motti.  “Knitting.”

 

“So… we’re done here then…?” whimpered the sheep.

 

“No, my end of the bargain here is I owe that bunny and her fox,” explained the badger. “I get to take out the trash, as it were.  I help you, and she doesn’t deal with you again.  Right?”

 

“Right…” replied an honestly crestfallen sheep.  “What happened to not-too-late to change?”

 

“You gotta change for you, Lamb-burger, not for them.”  Sharla cringed at that, but nodded slowly.

 

“Can you at least help me prove he’s got nothing to do with any sheep conspiracy?”

 

“Well…”  The badger sat up straighter.  “I may not look it, but I know more about both sides of this conspiracy than anyone else.”  The ewe gazed at honey blankly.  Oh no, she looked it.  “I know all about the sheep involved, and I know tons of mammals who resisted them every day.  If your brother’s name’s been floated out there for any reason, I can scan through logs and documents and everything and find it.”  This encouraged the sheep a lot, and she sat up, clutching her hooves together.  Yes.  This was it.  Some real help.  “But I still don’t know why Vivienne wanted you messed up when you got here.”

 

“Why do you say she wanted me messed up?” asked Sharla, her velvety ears falling back as she frowned.  Okay, maybe not help.

 

“You said she told you to tell me to give you an arrow to point the way?” verified the badger.

 

“That’s what she told me to say, y- oh, no!”  The ewe cupped her blunt caprid muzzle in horror.  There had been __meaning__  of which the sheep was completely unaware.

 

“Yeah, not a five star recommendation from our town’s fair Maiden, if you will.”  Sharla found herself squeezed against the badger’s side.  “So… what did you doooo?”  The question was pleading, as if it might follow with a scolding, not having her skeleton turned to powder by a hyena.

 

“I was a raging anti-fox bigot,” sighed Sharla.  Definitely no help to be had here.  This was worse.  She had been agonized over this the whole train ride over.  She had been awful to Vivienne.  

 

“Ah.  Not enough to ruffle __that__  fox’s fluff, I promise ya.  Go on.”

 

Sharla sighed out slowly and laid herself bare.  “I said mean things about her son.”  Honey continued to bear down on her with that skeptical gaze.  Somehow she knew there was more.  She needed more.  “… and said hateful things about fox kits.”

 

Motti and Honey both jerked back as if Sharla had vomited that last part, not just mentioned it.  The badger scooted way over to the other side of the couch.  “Yeaaaah…” Honey drawled.

 

“I’m sorry, okay?  I haven’t eaten, drank, slept… I promise you, I haven’t been myself, alright, and I admit it, okay?  I was wrong.  I know you said you’re gonna help me, but please don’t think this is all I am.  I deserve everyone being mad at me, I messed this up good, but… I don’t want to leave here with everyone thinkin’ the Shearer family was … this.”  She indicated herself, still feeling like the absolute peak of suck in all the universe.  Getting stabbed in the face might have actually been better.

 

“Wait, Shearer?” Honey deadpanned.

 

“Yeah, I’m Sharla Shearer.  That’s my last name.”

 

“And your brother’s name is also Shearer?” asked the badger.

 

“Y… yes…”  

 

“Gareth?” pressed Honey.

 

That went like a fox-fired arrow through the ewe.  Oh God.  She knew.  Somehow, Vivienne had known exactly what the hell she was talking about.  Sharla had not given her brother’s name to anyone since she’d arrived.  She was sure of it.  The ewe forgot, for a moment, how much she felt like she was just the worst possible mammal and latched on to the slightest little glimmer of hope.

 

“Yes.  Gareth!” pled Sharla, near tears.

 

Honey deflated in a long, tired sigh and leaned heavily back on the couch, putting her big paws over her black and white face.  Sharla’s heart froze.  This seemed… not good.

 

“Motti, get the whiskey,” the badger ordered.  “Sharla, hon… I don’t have… the best sort of news for you.”


	3. Brothers

 

****Sheepless in New Reynard** **

_ _Chapter 3:  Brothers_ _

 

 

 

A quarter tumbler of bourbon sat untouched on the coffee table.  Motti had kindly poured that for Honey, but the badger simply took the bottle and had been nursing on that for about twenty minutes.  Sharla watched in despair.  She didn’t even know what this was about.  This badger knew her brother.  Or at least, she knew about him.  She hadn’t said a word to the sheep since the bottle came out.  She just kind of stared at the fancy blue ‘Media’ screen on her TV and took slow, agonized drinks.

 

This was so not good.

 

The waiting was the worst.

 

“Please…” Sharla semi-bleated.

 

Honey sighed slowly.  “What do ya wanna hear, huh?” she asked with a bit of depressed exasperation.

 

“I want to hear that’s he’s okay!” squeaked the sheep.

 

“Okay… uh… how about something else?” asked Honey.

 

“Oh no.”  Sharla clutched her chest.  “No, no, no.”  She stood up and moved to just run out of the room.  She was gonna be sick.  The room was spinning.  She needed to run away.  She needed to just not __be__ for a while.  She knew.  Somehow she knew.

 

“Second on the right,” Motti directed.  Glancing that way, down the hall, the ewe saw a restroom.  That was useful information, but no comfort.  She leaned her head against the wall, trembling.

 

“Was he involved?” asked the sheep.  “Was he mixed up in that whole… God.  No.  My mom and dad are gonna be completely… I can’t tell them…  Why, Gareth?  Why?” she whimpered, tears spilling freely.

 

“Sit down,” commanded Honey.  “I don’t know that I have all th’ comfort you want, but I think I have… some help to offer still, if you’ll listen.”  Sharla pinched her eyes shut, tears already moving down her cheeks.

 

“Is he dead?” she pled.

 

“Sit,” Honey requested again, her tone just kind of tired, perhaps a little inebriated.

 

“No, screw you!  Is he __dead__?” snapped the sheep.

 

“Motti, help our guest be seated.”  The badger gestured to the trembling sheep.  A hyena approached.

 

“Sitting!” Sharla cried, moving hastily to the chair, not the couch.  She didn’t want to be near anyone right then.

 

“Gareth… was not a bad sheep.”  Honey’s words both offered a balm to a freshly opened wound in Sharla’s heart, and then destroyed her heart completely.  He wasn’t bad.  That was good.  But at the same time, Honey spoke of her brother in the __past tense.__   Sharla sputtered, leaning forward and putting her face into her hooves.  It didn’t take her college education to know the use of past tense wasn’t good.  A huge hyena paw petted the wool on top of her head.  It continued petting.  It squeezed and touched.  Really?  Why did everyone who wasn’t a sheep __do__ that?

 

Sharla batted the paw away.  “Tell me what happened,” she insisted.

 

“So, first, I should tell ya why I know who Gareth Shearer even was,” Honey stated.

 

“Yeah,” Sharla responded glumly.  Was again.  She used was.  Why continue this conversation?  Because it was important to know what actually happened to him, that’s why.  He deserved that.

 

“So… I was always a little keen that there was something like… goin’ on with the sheep,” Honey said lazily.  Oh yeah.  She was feeling the whiskey.  It was like she didn’t even care that she was talking to a sheep about the thing going on with the sheep.  She took another sip.  Sharla held out her cloven hoof.  The bottle made a little ‘tink’ as it made contact with keratin and the sheep brought the bottle up and drank.  She instantly remembered why she never drank.  That was not even a flavor.  It was just an unpleasant experience.  She winced and swallowed painfully and passed the bottle back.  

 

“Go on…” huffed the sheep.  No more of that.

 

“I mean, it was obvious to anyone __really__ lookin’, and when Lionheart made Bellwether an assistant mayor, there was someone in his inner circle, another badger… she told a friend of mine that there were issues up top with those two.  Dawn was doin’ shady stuff behind the mayor’s back.  She was trying to sabotage his inclusion initiative, she was doctoring crime statistics…  We knew that stuff even before Lionheart got arrested.  I was part of a message board that tracked the ‘Cudspiracy’.”

 

“Please don’t call it that.  It wasn’t all sheep,” grumbled Sharla.  She took another drink, and didn’t know why.  It was just as terrible the second time.  Whatever.  She expected terrible.  She deserved terrible.

 

“Yeeeeah, and whatever vulpine messed you up wasn’t all __foxes__.  Whatever, sweater-factory,” grumbled the immediately irritated Honey.  It was an instant and unpleasant reminder to Sharla that she didn’t get to call the tipsy host out for that.  She was just as bad, if not worse.  “Where was I?  Oh yeah… This badger was on the city’s medical board.  Hell, she helped make the damned… what’s it called… antidote for the Nighthowler victims…”  Yeah, Honey was loosened up by alcohol.  “…Anyway, she initially got arrested for helpin’ Leodore Lionheart with the false-imprisonment thing.  So the whispers from her stopped.  It’s partly how we know __where__ those clues were comin’ from, but the anti-Cudspiracy became an actual movement as a result, and I got more involved then.”

 

“What’s this got to do with Gareth?” asked the sheep.  Another tink of her hoof and another terrible drink.  Was it self abuse?  Maybe.

 

“Gettin there, Textiles,” grunted the badger.  “Anyway, one main group ended up kind of rising to the surface as the go-to Resistance… as it were.  Nothing open.  No protests, but holy heck did they sabotage the Bellwether administration.  Public sentiment made life hard for preds, but she wanted to make things much harder.  The little ideas she had for ‘improving’ things would make it out to the media and get __blown up__ , and it was the general population that would protest it.  It was that conflict that kept her from moving a lot faster with restricted housing, mandating claw-length-caps, and muzzles in schools.”

 

That last one was like a knife in Sharla’s gut.  What a pure, unmitigated monster she’d been to Vivienne, and here was the answer, delivered up to her as promised.  Foxes were better than she deserved.  At least, __that__ fox sure as hell was.  Another slightly larger drink.  Okay, she was starting to feel light and airy.  Time to stop that.

 

“I won’t… argue with you, Bellwether was a creep,” Sharla stated.  She genuinely felt that way.  The city almost destroyed itself under her.

 

“Yeah, well, the resistance slowed her down, and in the end, that was all we needed.  But… after Bellwether got canned and tossed in the clink, the thing I suspected all along was confirmed.  It was bigger than Dawn Bellwether, and it had been for __so__ freaking long.”

 

“Lanolin, yeah,” Sharla grumbled.  Everything got messed up because of some crap that got done a hundred years ago.  It wasn’t fair.

 

“Not just Lanolin.  A bunch of big names in tech and agriculture were directly involved.  There was Graze, Wooltech, Cloven…”

 

“Wait, Cloven?!” Sharla bleated suddenly.

 

“Yeah,” Honey drawled.

 

“My dad and brother work for them!” she hissed.  “I didn’t hear anything about Cloven being involved!”

 

“You __will__.  Remember how I said you were gettin’ confidential stuff?” the badger reaffirmed.  Sharla cringed.  Okay, she was in deep.  She wasn’t going back from here.

 

“So my brother was involved?  My dad?!  My __dad’s__ involved?!”  Sharla was in a panic.  She stood up.

 

“Motti,” Honey gestured.  The sheep immediately sat back down.

 

“I don’t… I don’t know about your dad,” came the drunken response, “…like you said, not every sheep has something to do with it.  But yeah, your brother was absolutely involved.”  She kind of laughed at that last part.

 

“No!  You said he was a good sheep!” cried the black-woolen ewe.

 

“I did and I meant it,” Honey rumbled, “See, he woulda been __useless__ to the resistance if he __wasn’t__ involved.  We wouldn’t have had a… clean and genuine source for information.”

 

“What?!” cried Sharla.  “Wait, he was… he was a __spy__?!”  Somehow, the idea that he was some kind of double agent in all this seemed way, __way__  more messed up to the ewe.  Her brother was part of both the ‘Cudspiracy’ __and__  the resistance?  Suddenly, she had an inkling as to what must have happened.  She felt so cold as she considered it.

 

“Nothing that seriously… grand,” Honey gestured flamboyantly.  “He wasn’t goin’ on action-packed Jack Savage kind of missions or nothin’.”  The badger held up the bottle, but decided against taking another drink.  She put the cork in it and set it down.  “He just had access to information through the company he worked for.  It’s a subsidiary for Lanolin, and apparently, since it was __way__ out in the boonies, they liked storing sensitive documents about acquisitions and all that out there.  Remember I told you there was a… main group for the Resistance?”  Sharla stared.  Honey was slumped back on the couch.  She was actually… pretty smashed, it sounded like.

 

“Yeah?” asked the fairly tipsy sheep.

 

“They apparently got approached by an employee at Cloven who said that he found out about the Resistance on the web, and he had information.”  Sharla sucked in a deep breath.  He was trying to help.  He was brave.  He wasn’t a criminal. He was a silent hero.  She could be proud of her brother.   _ _Please__ let this be what was coming.

 

“So, you are sure it was him?  My brother?” she asked.

 

“Back when he made contact, I’d been made information-maven for the group.  I shot up through the ranks because of all the data I’d already gathered.  I started getting these genuine, serious-business documents.   _ _Obviously__ I was skeptamic… ske… skeptical about them… and I did some deep digging into where they were coming from.”

 

This was it.  He was a hero.  No one could take that away from Sharla.  He was not helping the stupid ‘Cudpsiracy’, he was doing the exact opposite.  

 

Honey closed her eyes and continued, “Your brother might have been a help to the resistance, but he certainly wasn’t a trained spy.  He left his name __twice__ on file requisition cover sheets.  Still, only two of us in the Resistance knew who he was.  We… kindly redacted his name from the docs he provided.”

 

“Thanks for that, I guess…” sighed his sister.  Not that it helped him in the end apparently.  She then had a thought.  “Wait… so who was the other one that knew who he was?”  Was he betrayed?  Could she possibly have a name to go after?

 

“The… the leader of that resistance group, actually,” Honey answered.  “Obviously that guy was __way__ more careful.  I don’t know his __real__ name.  He went by Big-Bad.  Give you a guess on the species there.”  Honey chuckled weakly.

 

“Damn it, really?” asked the glum sheep.  “Do wolves enjoy playing up to their own stereotypes?” she asked.

 

“Hey, I never asked.”  Honey grinned drunkenly as she waved a dismissive paw.

 

“Were… you involved closely with Big-Bad?  Do you know where he is now?” Sharla inquired.  Someone was getting held responsible.  The hunt was on.  A sheep hunting a wolf.  How nuts was that?  The badger shot her a wary look.

 

“Slow your roll, there, Lamb-burger,” she said, waving dismissively.  “Big-Bad was __legit__.  He was freakin’ gold.  He didn’t do __nothin’__  to your brother.  But when the fluff hit the fan, we couldn’t get to ‘im in time.”  Oh.  Oh crap.  “…See, __we__ had redacted his name so others in our group didn’t have that information, but that didn’t change the internal records still at Cloven.  When the ZBI started shakin’ stuff up and heads started to roll…” a rude belch interrupted and she resumed, “…Lanolin and their cronies did a __burn__.”

 

“A… A burn?” asked Sharla shakily.  That… sounded bad.  That sounded so seriously bad.

 

The badger rubbed her face slowly in silence and then sighed.  “A __burn__ is where you basically destroy all evidence and witnesses when the crime’s been discovered.  They had folks on the inside that saw the documents used to link mammals to the ‘Cudspiracy’, and they got his name before we even knew what was goin’ on.  While I was dealin’ with the attack in New Reynard, they got to Gareth.”

 

It was like falling.

 

He was killed.  It wasn’t predators.  It wasn’t foxes.  It wasn’t wolves or tigers or bears.  Her brother was murdered by sheep.

 

“Are you… sure?” whispered a very unhappy Sharla.

 

“I got the message myself.  ‘ _ _Cloven contact compromised.  Too late to help him.  I have taken care of cleanup.  Mourn Gareth Shearer.  The fellowship is dissolved.  Be on your guard.’__ It was short and clear.  To the point.  It’s what I liked that wolf.” Honey stated.  “That was the last I heard from Big-Bad. I’m pretty sure __that__ was absolute.  The end of the Cudspiracy.  The end of the Resishtance.  The end… of it all,” slurred the badger.

 

“So that’s it…” Sharla grumbled, feeling detached.  It was the alcohol, probably.

 

“Yep,” the badger responded.

 

“He’s dead,” the sheep added.  The pain welled up quickly.  Being tipsy only slightly delayed the inevitable.

 

“Gonna say yeah, definitely.”  Honey sounded more loose and careless in her response, but it was expected.  She was drunk.  She had a good reason to be, Sharla agreed.  All of this sucked, and she was actually speaking to the sister of a hero that was lost in all that.  It was a bad day for everyone.  Sharla uncorked the bottle.  A long, hard drink followed.

 

Then the dam broke.  Honey actually stayed back, seeming not to want to interfere with the sister of the sheep that got killed helping someone who absolutely despised sheep.  It was an understandable level of discomfort.  

 

Motti, however, sat close, even though she made no attempt to hug or hold the crying ewe.  Sharla made no attempt to seek comfort.  These mammals were doing a dangerous thing and dealing with dangerous  animals.  They knew what could happen, and the news made it clear others died too.  Swinton was assassinated in her car at the airport.  Important mammals were taken out just as readily as not-so-important ones.  The idea that they could kill her brother was not some delusional fantasy.

 

Sharla had done a lot of agonizing these past few weeks, and after about ten or fifteen minutes of potent sobbing, she felt kind of emotionally numb.  After another five minutes or so of quietly staring at the boring, useless blue Media screen, the badger spoke.  “Tell us… about who your brother was.  We should remember him.  That seems like the better thing to do, yeah?”

 

Sharla sipped again and then corked and set the bottle on the couch.  “Like you said… He sure wasn’t spy material.  I think you’d have dumped Gareth in the ‘extra-annoying-sheep’ category, if you’ve got one of those.”

 

“I don’t categorize sheep,” Honey murmured.  She then rubbed her face.  “Well, I guess I kind of do.  I have sheep… and okay sheep.”

 

“Gareth was okay sheep?” Sharla asked.

 

“Yeah.  Gareth was his own category.  He was Sheep-deluxe.”  Honey framed that new term and gave a weak laugh.  The badger was hammered.

 

Sharla could not help but crack a smile at it.  “That sounds like a quick-fix dinner, not a category for a sheep!”

 

“Well, he was good sheep,” Honey said genuinely.

 

“Sorry I could not meet him.” said Motti.  The ewe offered the hyena the bottle.

 

“Oh no, no, no.”  The badger took the bottle away.

 

“Is bad idea,” promised the hyena.  

 

“How about me?  What category do I fall in?  I’ve said all these dumb things and I’m certainly nothing like my brother.”

 

“You’re okay sheep,” drawled Honey in a mushy tone.  “Did your brother have lots of hobbies or anything?  Much family other than you?”  This kind of surprised the ewe.  Their hostess seemed to actually care about learning more about Gareth.

 

“He was a quagmire of them, honestly,” laughed Sharla.  This was… helping.

 

“Ooh, a quagmire, that sounds sherious!” happily slurred the badger.

 

“It was like… something new every other month.  He’d be super into some video game, then he’d be trying out a table-top roleplay system with a couple school buddies.  Then, it would be writing stories, or he’d be hanging out on chat forums and the like… Maybe then he’d be all about UFOs and cryptids for like, a week… It was all over the darned place.”

 

The badger chuckled warmly at that.  “I don’t know why ya think I’d put him in the annoying sheep basket.  He sounds like he’d have been fun.  I like all that junk too.”  Sharla smiled at Honey’s consensus, then sighed.  It hurt.  It wasn’t the explosive anguish now.  Talking about him helped.  But it ached.  The ewe felt so completely empty.  How long would it take to feel right again?

 

Then, she really took a moment to think about what tomorrow was going to be like.  She found out what happened, but… Everyone else would not care about a story.  They needed proof he was doing the right thing.  If not, Gareth would just be another sheep that bolted during the fall of Lanolin.  It would be suspicious forever!

 

“Honey?” she asked the quiet badger.

 

“What?” replied the sloshed mammal, sounding as if she was awakened from an unplanned nap.  

 

Sharla took a deep breath, feeling the heaviness of the moment in all her close-trimmed wool.  “Can you take me to see Big-Bad so I can take my brother and lay him to rest properly?”

 

“No.  No way.  Even if I __knew__ where he was, I sure as heck wouldn’t give him up to someone I barely know.  Why would you even ask?”

 

“Please.  I have to __find__  him.  I want Gareth back.  Screw everything else!  He’s what... in a shallow freakin’ grave somewhere?  On some vacant lot or dumped in a river or something?”  Anger prickled again, enhanced by booze.  “You gotta help me find him or you haven’t done __nothin’__ but tell stories!”

__

“This ain’t a game of hide-n-seek, Sheep!” snapped the badger, sitting up.  Sharla was being a literal buzz-kill and she knew it, but this was important.  “It ain’t just your life or your brother’s at stake.  Bad mammals are still __after__ the Resistance.  We gave a lot of intel to the ZBI and the ZPD.  Any of us pops our head up, it’s likely to get knocked off.  In time maybe, but for now.  I really recommend you let this be!”

 

“Yeah, you make me find him my damned self.  I will leave this place asking questions I shouldn’t be asking and talking to mammals I should have avoided, but there’s no way that can come back on __you__ , right?” Sharla practically purred.

 

“Oh you gotta be damned kiddin’ me!” cried Honey.

 

“Get me to the spot,” whimpered the black sheep.  “Help me find my brother so I can at least clear his name, and really make sure he gets laid to rest.  If he’s a hero to you guys, you owe him that.  Forget anything owed to me, I don’t ask that.  Gareth deserves to be remembered for what he did, not what mammals assume.”

 

The badger snarled back, “You seem t’ really think I didn’t __care__ about what happened to your brother or something.  Otherwise, I can’t imagine you thinkin’ I would be totally cool with indirectly killin’ his sister too.”  She waved at the sheep dismissively.

 

“My risk!  If you’re worried about getting found out, I can keep your name out of it.  I can make sure this never gets back to you.”

 

“I don’t got any reason to trust you, sheep,” Honey growled.

 

“It’s Sharla!  And you trusted my brother, right?  Oh, but it was just __his__ neck on the line.”  Sharla could not possibly have been as narrow-minded as this badger.

 

“I __did__ … You’re right.  I even label him as Sheep Deluxe!  And I can’t help but be cautious about why __you__ knew nothing about __any__ of what Shearer was doin’.  It seems I’m not the only one who didn’t trust you.” Sharla jerked hard from that.  That was uncalled for!  She suffocated the urge to just scream at the badger.  She was sure that it wasn’t about trust, but fear.  Gareth had been protecting her.  That’s the kind of mammal he was.

 

“You are going to help me find him, or I will absolutely find a way to make you help me find him,” Sharla growled, arms tight against her sides.   She didn’t want to resort to holding things over this mammal’s head, but she felt trapped.  Everyone would think he was involved and ran, and without proof, even if Sharla tried to tell everyone what he was doing, it might put her in serious danger.

 

“What makes you think I won’t just send you to see him personally?”  Honey stood up slowly.  Motti stood up too.  The alcohol and her grim determination kept Sharla facing the semi-blitzed badger.

 

“I… I don’t think you’ll do it,” the ewe grumbled stoically.  “You aren’t a __bad__ mammal and neither am I.”  Sharla was betting a lot on the assumption that the badger played it tough, but would need a bigger threat than a second grade teacher looking for her brother to be driven to actually hurt someone.

 

Honey pushed in very close, actually a little shorter than the ewe, but so much heavier and stronger.  She was significantly more dangerous.  Sharla held still more out of fear than bravery.  Okay, maybe she misjudged this.  The world felt shaky again.  No attack came as a full minute passed.

 

“I hate you so much,” growled Honey, finally.

 

“I don’t care,” muttered the sheep.

 

“But!  I don’t hate you enough to send you to get killed by Big-Bad,” the badger stated solidly.  “It ain’t gonna happen.  I wouldn’t even do that to a __sheep__.  That’s how bad __that__ would be.”

 

“That’s __my__ chance to take!”

 

“Your chance, but my blessing.  No.”  Honey was defiant.

 

“God, why do you hate me?” asked Sharla.  She should at least have something to counter.

 

“I don’t know, why do you hate foxes?!” spat the badger.

 

“Why?  Fine!  I was bullied for like… half my childhood by a fox!  I watched my best friend get her face __ripped__  off of her by a fox when all she was trying to do was get back some stupid tickets we got at the fair.  Gareth had nightmares over what happened to Judy, okay?  We all got hurt.  Maybe not the same as you did, but we were __kits__!”

 

“Wait, Judy?” Honey diverted focus.

 

“Yeah?  Alright, she got hurt by a fox!  So you wonder what I had against her being with Nick, there you go.”

 

“Shetani still has a face,” Motti pointed out obviously.

 

“She healed!” snapped Sharla.

 

“Nick doesn’t seem like he’d be the type to have done that to a bunny.”  The tone the badger used was slow and reflective.

 

“It wasn’t Nick, she didn’t know him back then,” Sharla admitted, knowing instantly why Honey prompted her to say that.  Damn it, they were just going to go in circles.  “It’s wrong, okay?  I admitted that already. I was wrong.  But I had a __reason__ to feel like I did.  To… end up like I did.  That’s it.  That’s the reason.  I never freaking got over seeing all that blood and knowing if I’d just ran off… or dropped the tickets… or a million other things - she’d never have had to do that!”

 

“Shetani had no scar on her face,” Motti pointed out.

 

“Damn it, they’re there. They aren’t big but she’s got three claw marks under her fur on her cheek.  Forever.”  Sharla threw herself down onto the couch.  Why was this so hard to explain without sounding like a petty creep?

 

“You still don’t get it!  You still fail to see the way out of this dumb cycle you’re in!” shouted Honey.

 

“Motti gets it.” the hyena nodded slowly.  

 

Sharla gritted her teeth.  “Okay, hyena, share with me then!  What do you get!?”  Sharla gave up tamping down her anger.  She was close to just losing it again.  She was so close to finding her brother, absolving him of the crime he never committed, and even having him lauded as a hero.  This obstinate, mercurial badger stood in her way and it was absolutely infuriatingly unfair.

 

“Sharla is selfish.  Selfish mammals don’t protect Honey’s name,” Motti stated confidently.

 

“What?  How?!  How am I being selfish here?” the sheep wrinkled her nose in revulsion at that.

 

“This thing, it happen to Shetani, yes?  The fight?” Motti asked.

 

“Judy, you mean.  When we were kits, yes,” came Sharla’s reply.

 

“She is not hating foxes.  She not afraid of Nick.”  Motti pointed out.  Sharla frowned.

 

“Yeah, so she’s __better__ than me.  No argument there.  Doesn’t make __me__ selfish for being upset about it.”

 

“She not afraid of his claws, he use them on her and it make her happy.  His teeth even more, Motti watch.  It was being very nice.”  The hyena nodded serenely.

 

“Oh my God, I don’t want to know that!” exclaimed the sheep with exasperation.

 

Honey laughed at the sheep’s reaction.  “She has a point though.  Judy’s the one who got hurt, but she certainly didn’t hate foxes after that.  I wonder why?”

 

The ewe looked away, having to consider that question a moment.  Judy had plenty of reason not to trust foxes.  Now, she was sleeping with one.  What happened?  Why wasn’t she even more angry than Sharla about that?  The sheep answered uneasily, “She didn’t like Gideon… I know that… But I guess she just kinda used the incident to reinforce that she was gonna be a cop.  She was energized by it.  I guess she just saw all of that day __different__ _ _ly__.  It was a fight.  She was honestly pretty proud of it because she got our tickets back.  A taste of being the hero.  She chased that feeling all the time after that.  It made her want to help mammals even more.  Okay?  I get it.  She grew up into something better.  But she was selfish too.  She still wanted to be a hero to everyone else.  That’s more about her than everyone else, right?”

 

Honey glared, baring all her teeth as she responded in a growling voice.  “Ooooh, so selfish… gonna get myself cut in half saving Motti’s family because I can’t stop thinking about how cool it must be to have a scar from armpit to armpit.”

 

Sharla winced at that.  Okay, that was a completely flawed argument on her part.  Counting that as a big loss.  Also, badger was super protective of Judy.  She did not want to forget that again.  The ewe sank a bit, hooves clenched, shaking in grief and frustration.  “How am __I__  being the selfish one then?  Wanna fill me in here before I say something else dumb?  It’s all I seem to be able to do here.”

 

“ _ _You__ didn’t get injured by fox, Shetani did.” Motti pointed out.  “But you feel guilty about it and you make whole fight about you.  This is between her and fox.  But you make it about how __you__ feel. You don’t stop thinking about how this is hurting because you want it to be hurting.  It becomes who you are.  Judy have nothing to forgive herself for because she think she win, but Sharla feel like sheeps lost.  They got tickets and tickets only remind them of blood.  Sharla don’t enjoy the fair.  It is not being any good to forgive because the hurt is too important.  It is big excuse to forgive own unhappiness.  This is selfish.”  

 

The ewe stared blankly at the massive spotted mammal a moment.  Motti’s tenuous grasp on the language aside, she was not a dumb brute.  She was right.  Sharla was mad about the tickets.  She remembered that very clearly.  She didn’t want to be at the fair anymore.  She didn’t want the tickets.  She didn’t even want to stay with the brother, who was messed up by that experience even worse because his sister ran off afterward.

 

Sharla was selfish.  Hating foxes for her unhappiness was only a selfish excuse.  

 

That was actually an easier pill to swallow than the first, but it definitely felt like ‘beat up on the second grade teacher’ was today’s special.

 

The ewe sighed in surrender. “Okay, fine.  I’m selfish.  Just look at all my damned flaws!” the sheep flourished.  “But my brother __wasn’t__  selfish.  That’s who I want to help.  He stood up for what was right.  I bet the whole town would have hated him for it if he got found out and the ‘Cudspiracy’ didn’t get proven!  He was doing the right thing and staked his life on it!  Now, no one’s willing to help his memory!”  To Sharla’s surprise, Motti suddenly shrunk back, as if, for a moment, fearful.  The ewe glanced back at Honey, continuing.  “He was willing to risk himself for something that was bigger than him, and he deserves to be known for that!  You want that truth to just stay buried with him?  After he helped you with the promise of nothing else?”  His words flooded back into his sister’s head.  He was going to do what was right.  He wasn’t going to be afraid next time.  He did it.  How flawed his sister appeared in his shadow now.

 

“He wouldn’t want other lives risked when his was over,” explained Honey sagely.  “You’d be in danger.  He’d never want that.  I told you before, this ain’t because I don’t want justice.  It’s because that can come later and you can still be alive.”

 

“Motti will find him for you,” the hyena said softly.

 

“What?” Honey dropped bluntly.

 

“She is… right.  Brother does not deserve whole village thinking… he is bad when he do the best good.”  Her words were heavy.  Honey’s expression completely changed.  She looked absolutely agonized with some internal strife or realization.  Sharla sucked in a deep, hopeful breath.  Yes!  Yes, she won Motti over!  She could still do this!  Sharla stood up in front of the hyena and nodded emphatically.

 

“Right!  I will go with Motti!  She can help keep me safe.  Tell her where to go and you aren’t even directly involved for all this ‘Big-Bad’ wolf knows!”

 

“Sheep stays. Motti goes,” the hyena stated flatly.

 

“No!  I’m coming with you!  I have to do this!” shouted Sharla indignantly.  This was her business.  It felt completely wrong to send someone else, and it only meant more secrets.  The hyena would not even have to try to actually find Gareth, she could just wander around a couple of days and say he wasn’t able to be found.  That was not going to be the end of this.

 

“Honey is being correct.” Motti expressed, “Gary is never wanting his sister to be hurt like this.  You let him have peace by staying.”  Honey sighed softly at her friend’s words.

 

“Gareth!  And it’s not even your business!  It’s mine!  I am not staying here!” the sheep cried, shaking with anger again.  Honey just gazed down, seeming lost a moment.

 

“This is Motti’s choice.  Motti’s danger.  It is not for you.  This is Motti’s selfishness.  She needs to do this.”  The hyena sounded so kind and soft.  It didn’t fit her size at all.  Perhaps that was why Sharla felt so bold in her indignation and anger.

 

“No!  This isn’t __your__ family, Spots!” shouted the sheep, stepping closer.

 

“Sharla, wait-” interrupted Honey.

 

The angry ewe cut her off.  “You don’t wake up every day feeling empty of anything but freaking __regret__!  You don’t have to spend every day wondering if you could have been better!”  The hyena stared back blankly as if not even seeing the mad caprid in front of her anymore.

 

“No, seriously, stop!” Honey said louder, tensing up.  Sharla gritted her teeth bitterly.

 

“You didn’t have a __stupid__ brother make a stupid choice without even __asking__ you about it.  Your __stupid__ brother didn’t get rutting ‘burned’ because he thought his dumb heroic choices actually __mattered__ in the end!”

 

Honey jumped up with a shout, “Oh shi-”

 

__THUMP_ _


	4. Pineapples

 

****Sheepless in New Reynard** **

_ _Chapter 4:  Pineapples_ _

 

 

 

 

It was all a murmur of sounds at first.  The world was dark.  Things were muffled, and it was hard to tell what was going on.  Was she dreaming again?  Had she always been dreaming?  Slowly, her eyes fluttered open.  The world had been dark because her eyes were closed.  That made sense.  Her forehead was uncomfortable.  It was on something hard.  Her eyes couldn’t focus on anything.  It was just grey.  As her vision focused, Sharla found the grey to be a surface.  What kind of surface?  It was easy to get transfixed onto the what, and stop caring about the why.  It was… a tabletop.  

 

Slowly she sat up.  One side of her face felt heavier than the other.  Then it started throbbing.  Why did her face hurt?  Where was she?

 

It was a booth.  She was in some kind of restaurant.  Upbeat pop music of some sort was playing.

 

There were foxes all over the place.  Oh yeah.  She was in that weird fox town.

 

She gazed a little dizzily across from her in the booth.

 

There was a small fox there.  He was smiling at her with a plastic bag and comically large strawberry milkshake in front of him.  He was smartly dressed in a sweater and vest.  It looked like maybe a school uniform.  Blue eyes peered back at her.

 

“Nnnh… Hey there…” Sharla mumbled to the kit.  She put a hoof up to her cheek.  Okay, that was swollen a little.  It wasn’t… too bad.  Where the hell was she?  What happened?  She remembered the train.  Oh, and there was a house…

 

“I’m Sam.”  He sipped his shake.  There was a second straw and he indicated it.

 

“I’m Sharwa,” the sheep slightly slurred.  She pretended to not notice the offer to sip the milkshake like she was on a date with a strange young vulpine.  Finally, she reconnected with all of her memories as she remembered the house.  She was drinking.  She said something angrily to Motti.  She saw the hyena move, but had no idea what happened.  The image of her punching the sheep punching bag off its chain was clear in her mind though, so she assumed, given that her face was swollen and she woke up somewhere else, that she got punched out.  She’d never actually been __hit__  by another mammal before.  Not like that.

 

“Here…”  The little fox kit pushed the bag over to her.  He seemed polite enough.  He appeared to be about ten years old, but it was kind of hard to tell with foxes.  Sharla picked up the little bag and found that it was full of ice.

 

“Where am I?” she asked, using it as intended and pushing it to the side of her face.  It stung, but it was a ‘probably helping’ kind of sting.

 

“Musk Street Diner,” replied Sam.

 

“Where’s the badger… Honey?” the sheep inquired.  It was odd that after everything they would just dump her somewhere public.  She glanced out the window.  It was dark.  “Why are you here?  It’s like… the middle of the night.”

 

“It ain’t a school night,” he answered casually.  “I can stay out late.  I have to keep you from going anywhere till Honey and Motti get back.  They went to buy tickets.”

 

“What kind of tickets?”  She stared at the little vulpine before her.  She was… what?  His prisoner?  They left a little fox kit to watch over her?

 

Wait.

 

Those two mammals dragged a dead-looking sheep into a local eating establishment, dumped her in a booth, and left a kit watching over her with a milkshake.  And nobody here __cared__ about that?  What kind of town was this?!

 

“H-How long have I been here?” Sharla stammered.

 

“Not long.  Like… five or six songs.  I just got my shake.”  The little fox kit appeared so absolutely casual about everything, as if being left in charge of unconscious mammals was maybe his thing.

 

“Is there an adult I can talk to?” she asked.

 

“Annie’s over there.”  He pointed at a black-furred vixen, a little on the heftier side.  She was happily chatting with a lanky older male fox in jeans and t-shirt with a ball cap.  They were pretty busy with a lively discussion.  It only made it more apparent that literally no one was watching her except the kit who had apparently been paid in milk-shake to do just that.

 

Sharla didn’t know whether to be insulted or horrified.

 

“Where’s your mom?” the sheep pressed.

 

“She’s workin’ in the kitchen!” chimed Sam.

 

“I see…” Sharla murmured.  At least the kit wasn’t just in some diner with a stranger in the middle of the night alone.  Still, the entire experience after getting off the train felt so unreal.  Was Judy’s entire life like this?  Was it just this place?  Was it just these mammals?

 

“You wanna order some food?” offered the kit.  Sharla put her attention back on him, snapping out of it.

 

“I uh… I’m not hungry,” she lied.

 

“Judy Hopps likes the hot salad.  It’s a steamed veggie thing,” the kit informed.

 

“You… You know Judy Hopps?” the sheep tried to verify.

 

“Uh, __yeah__!” the kit piped matter-of-factly.  “She’s family.  I was kind of at her wedding.  Off to the side.  It was here, in the park.”  

 

Sharla just kind of sat there a moment, a numb realization creeping over her like water rising.

 

Judy was married to Nick.  That meant there was a wedding.  And there was family there.  Maybe there were friends there.  And it happened here in this town.  It wasn’t just this sudden choice that everybody thought was insane and ill informed and embarrassing.  There were families involved.  On both sides.  By the sound of it, the kit at least didn’t hate Judy.

 

“You… You’re related to her… mate?” queried the ewe.  “To Nick?”

 

“Yeah, his dad’s sister is my Gran.  He’s my cousin.”  The energetic fox nodded at that.  He was getting plenty of sugar, so that wasn’t a surprise.

 

“So… you know his mom?” she asked.

 

“Nick’s mom?  Vivienne?  Yeah, she used to work here in the diner.  She’s kind of a big deal here.  She moved to Zootopia though.  She makes the __best__ pies.”  The kit bounced a bit at that, obviously kicking little feet that didn’t touch the floor.  Sharla furrowed her brow.  That was two pie-baking foxes she knew of now.  While she still didn’t like Gideon, there was no doubt that his pies were the best, and he gave special pricing to the PTA so one could bet on seeing his baked goods at any fund-raising event.

 

“I guess… with the stuff that’s happened recently sheep seem pretty scary, huh?” examined Sharla.  She had wondered already if a lot of the younger generation were changed much by what was happening in the news.  First Bellwether, then the ‘cudspiracy’.  It was a lot.

 

“Scary?  I mean… the real big ones with weird eyes are… a little.  But you don’t really look like them.”

 

“What do they look like to you?” prodded Sharla.  An honest opinion.  She could ask him.  It was interesting to her.  

 

“I dunno… You know how if you wash a pillow and put it in the dryer… it comes out super puffy and you can’t jam it into a pillow case anymore?  They look like that.  Except someone jammed them in a shirt.”

 

Sharla stared in complete disbelief at the kit.  It was an agonizingly honest take on how he saw sheep.  She got exactly the answer she wanted but never, ever expected him to give.  It was not the wrong answer, and she certainly could not scold him for the comparison, but it was impressive to her that he didn’t even try to placate an actual sheep with something that might be deemed more polite.  She decided to change the subject.

 

“So… Where did Nick and Judy get married?  You said… in the park, right?  I was out there earlier this evening.”  She wanted to know more about the wedding.  Was it a big wedding?  Did they have a lot of friends and family?  

 

Judy didn’t even invite her.  In retrospect, that seemed… a good choice.

 

“Huh?  Oh, yeah.  In the park, right in front of the big statue!”

 

“Oh!  Right, I saw that too.”  Sharla nodded, feeling more like she was talking with a student than a stranger at that point.  “He’s… a pretty important cultural figure.  He’s been a part of vulpine fiction for a very long time!”

 

“Fiction?” deadpanned the little fox.

 

Sharla nodded curtly.  “Well, yeah!  I mean, he might be based off of someone, but the story itself is… is…”  As she spoke, the younger mammal’s ears slowly fell, eventually splayed out to their sides as he stared hard at the sheep.  Well… crap.

 

“He’s real,” Sam insisted.  “I mean, he was.  It’s okay, you’re a sheep.  You don’t know that stuff.”  His tone was anxious but dismissive.

 

“Well, it’s justifiable to say he lived, but… I mean… those things he did?  That stuff wasn’t…. I mean, there’s just no record to support it…  The other mammals in the story, the archery contest…  You don’t think someone can actually intentionally split another arrow in two…? the odds of that…”

 

The little fox glared at her.  “He’s real.  I feel like he’s real.”

 

“Feeling and being are very different.”  Sharla felt terrible to be put in this position, but she was an educator.  She couldn’t just… placate him with an untruth.  It went against everything she stood for.  There was a long pause from the narrow-eyed fox.  For a moment, it was very easy to forget that this mammal was a child.  Those were keen, clever, dangerous eyes.

 

Slowly, he extracted the second straw from the shake.  He ran it through his teeth to take off all the extra good stuff and sucked the straw clean before flicking it over his shoulder.

 

The message was loud and clear to Sharla.  She was no longer a friend of Sam the fox kit.

 

“Oh, it’s not as bad as all that!” the sheep pled.  “It’s just… not verifiable __history__.  I’m not saying there’s a problem with __wanting__  to believe it.  It’s a good story with lost of good lessons about… about caring… and…”  His eyes remained narrow and locked on her.  Did they teach them in the school here that it was real?  Was this a cultural thing?  Had she stomped on something inherently cherished to this kit?   _ _Was there any way out of this__?

 

“Okay, that’s done!” interrupted a familiar voice.  A welcome badger diversion had arrived at the table.

 

“No line, just slow lady at desk,” explained Motti.

 

“Thanks for tending to our guest, Sammy!” praised Honey as she handed the sheep a ticket.  It went to Deerbrook, pretty far south of Bunnyburrow.

 

“Oh… It’s for… an hour from now,” the ewe observed.  They would be on the train late into the night.  “There’s three of them.”

 

“Yep.  We’re going with you.  We are gonna meet Big Bad…  Then, after that, we are over quota for helping, understand?” pressed the badger.

 

“Am I done here?” inquired the youngest fox casually.

 

“Yeah!” chimed Honey.

 

“Did you like meeting with sheep?” Motti inquired of the kit.

 

“It was… pleasant!” complimented Sharla, wanting to at least imply that the kit earned his big milk shake.  She’s the one who made it awkward.  He did a good job in what he’d been left to do.

 

Sam took a slow, even breath, then proclaimed clearly, “Get sucked into a loom, sheep.”  He hopped out of the booth and wandered to the back.

 

Sharla cringed at the vicious remark from a kit so young.  Okay, she definitely did not endear herself there.  She would remember for the rest of __ever__  to leave this particular subject __alone__ where foxes were involved.  She had no idea it was even a big deal.

 

After Sam stalked off to the back, Honey stared back at the ewe, eyes huge and round.

 

“What the Hell, Sharla?!” she cried.

 

“I said the wrong thing,” the sheep stated glumly.

 

“Sam’s like… the unofficial greeter for the whole town!” cried the badger.  “He’s the sweetest, friendliest fox I’ve ever met!”

 

“Can we get out of here?” the sheep sighed.

 

Honey didn’t let it go.  “You can’t have been with him more than ten minutes!  How can you screw up hanging out with ‘Sweet Sam’ in ten minutes?!”

 

“We were talking about that statue in the park,” explained Sharla.

 

“Yeah?” asked the badger.

 

“I was trying to explain how that was a character from a story, not someone who actually existed,” the ewe elaborated.

 

“Oh…” murmured Motti in a dark tone.

 

“What?” Honey whined softly paws cupping her small ears back.

 

“He’s texting someone,” informed Motti, referring to the kit sitting in the booth way at the back of the diner.

 

“We gotta go,” growled the badger darkly.

 

“Oh please!” scoffed Sharla.  “I’m not scared of a little kit, and no one’s gonna attack me over my not believing a story.”  She did get up however.  They had a train to catch.

 

“Attacking you would be unlawful.  This ain’t a lawless town,” Honey explained.  “That said, kits here get away with a certain helping of mischief, and if you think fox mischief is cute and funny, then it’s obviously never happened to you.  We gotta go.”

 

Sharla gave a meaningless shrug and followed Motti out the door.  It had started to drizzle, so that made the world feel only more dark and foreboding.  Her eyes weren’t great for night time excursions, and in less than a quarter mile of walking she was reminded that foxes could see very well in the dark by the absence of street lights on the only road into town.  She could basically only move along listening to the soft ticky tack of Motti’s longer toe claws on the pavement.  

 

It was cold, the sheep didn’t know where she was going, and she was willingly following into the darkness the mammal responsible for her needing to hold a bag of ice to her own numbly aching jaw.  Had her life gone so completely off the rails when Gareth went missing, or was it the moment she met Vivienne Wilde?  Could she have ever resolved this unhappy chapter of her life without these mammals?  Was this so awful because it was already dark and unpleasant, or would her meeting these two have gone this badly under any other circumstance?

 

She plodded along considering these troubles when Motti began to speak, sounding as if she just wanted to break the rain-muffled silence.  “You are living in Zootopia city, sheep?”

 

“No, I live in Bunnyburrow.  That’s where I grew up.”  It was an innocuous conversation.  That wasn’t bad.  She’d try not to let her emotions go unchecked and screw it up.  Her ignorance in her interactions had been, so far, an insurmountable wall for her here.  The less she said without thinking, the better.

 

“This is where __Shetani__  grows up too, yes?” inquired the hyena.

 

“Yeah.  We grew up together,” the sheep replied, tensing up a bit.  The conversation automatically went to a subject that she could really mess up.

 

“What is __Shetani__  like as a kit?” Motti pried.

 

“Energetic and intense.  She liked to be involved and noticed.”  Sharla hoped none of that sounded unfriendly.  It wasn’t meant that way.

 

“Ha!  She still like that!”  Sharla exhaled a breath she had been tensely holding.  Good.  It wasn’t insulting.

 

“You call her __Shetani__ … is that a nickname… or is it like… and official title?”

 

“It’s a cultural figure,” explained Honey hastily.  “Someone who existed in the Interior long, long ago.  Someone who __existed__ ,” stressed the badger to imply that it was not acceptable to spout off otherwise.  The sheep nodded to show she understood.  No more debating cultural icons.  She had a sharp enough learning curve.

 

“ _ _Shetani ya Sungura__  comes during the dark times to protect the innocent mammals from the wicked ones.  She is… first guardian of the world.”  The sheep nodded at that, feeling a prickle of a chill under her short and tended wool.  Judy had made a __serious__ impression on this mammal.

 

“So, you feel she is this same __Shetani__ mammal?  Born again?”  The sheep wanted to understand just how deep that sentiment went here.

 

“Yes?  No?  Maybe?” answered the hyena nebulously.  “She represent __Shetani__.  She is like __Shetani.__   To give name to friend is making them important to Motti.  It is custom where I lived.”

 

“Does her mate have a name too?” asked the ewe carefully.  It was so dark.  They were all just… voices in the dark.  Somehow, this made conversation feel a lot more powerful.  Everything said was focused because their words were about all the sheep knew as she shuffled along behind her companions.

 

“Her mate is __Janga__ ,” explained Motti.

 

“Is that another figure from the past?” Sharla queried, careful to make it clear she wasn’t dismissing the legends from the hyena’s homeland.

 

“No, it is word meaning ‘disaster’.”  The explanation from her hyena companion made the sheep stumble slightly.  Was there no reverence for the fox part of the duo?

 

“Was he the __cause__ of some disaster?”  Sharla hoped again that she wasn’t being insulting, but the previous answer only left bigger questions.

 

“No.  He is suffering frequent unhappy things and complain that this happen too much.  It is not bad name.  It is just impression that Motti gets from him early.”  The sheep nodded, thinking she understood.

 

“Do… I mean… Would I have a name then?  What would my name be... based on your time with me?”  She immediately felt stupid for asking.  This was a thing Motti did for her __friends__.  Nick and Judy earned their names.

 

Surprisingly, the hyena quickly responded, “You are having name of __Kuanguka Kondoo__.”

 

“Wow…  Koo-an.. goo-ka?  Kon… kon-dah?” the ewe carefully pronounced it.  She would have to try to remember that.  “Is that a name or does it mean something specific?”

 

“It mean ‘Falling Sheep’.”

 

The near silence of the drizzly darkness was obliterated as Honey exploded with laughter.  Sharla winced, but it was certainly earned.  Besides, it was something Motti gave to mammals who mattered to her.  That wasn’t a bad thing right?  Even Nick, who the hyena clearly respected, had a kind of insulting-sounding name.  It’s just the impression that Sharla had initially provided.

 

“That’s… that’s fair enough,” she chuckled as Honey’s laughter got under control.  “I like it, thank you.”

 

“Hey, there’s some graciousness in there!” Honey laughed, swatting the ewe’s back jovially and nearly making her fall over.  There was a short pause, and the badger spoke again.  “Hey wait!  I never hear you call __me__ anything other than Honey!”

 

“You are Motti’s boss,” the hyena explained.  “It is rude to be calling you name other than one you are calling yourself.  This is very informal thing.”

 

“Okay, so you don’t call me a name, but do I __have__ one?” Honey pressed, making it clear in her tone that she might be unhappy if she was left out.

 

“Yes,” answered Motti without immediately elaborating.

 

“Well?” badgered Honey.  “What is it?”

 

“You are __Mananasi__.”  The hyena nodded at that.

 

“Mah-nah-nah-see!” repeated the badger triumphantly.  “I love it.  What’s it mean?”

 

“It is pineapple.”

 

“What?” Honey dropped blankly.

 

“Is what it is meaning.”

 

“How is __that__ an early impression?  Can I have a new one?” she asked.

 

“You maybe like __Kelele na Mbwa Mwitu__  better,” offered the hyena.

 

“What’s that one mean?” queried the badger.

 

“Noisy with wolf,” answered Motti with a tone in her voice that made it obvious she was grinning.  Sharla blanched in the darkness.  That could __not__ have meant what it sounded like.

 

“Hey!” snapped Honey indignantly.  “I said I was sorry about that!  I completely forgot I roomed you beside the bath!”  The sheep inwardly groaned.  Oh no, it was exactly what it sounded like.  Motti laughed.  The badger spoke again after a few more moments of walking.  “Okay, so… Pineapple… __Mananasi__ … It’s a cool-sounding name, but why pineapple?  I didn’t give you pineapples when we first met.”  Sharla, quietly listening, had to admit that she was very curious about this as well.

 

“It is not the fruit,” Motti responded, “In place where Motti is from, to call mammal a __Mananasi__ is about who they are, not what they are.  Being… pineapple… it is like…”  She had to think a moment.  It might have been hard in that context to try to put her thoughts into words.  “It is mammal being very hard to handle first.  Sharp and hard and maybe they don’t want to be friends.  But inside, they maybe is sweet and better.  Roughness outside is to protect.  They protect those close to them just as hard.   _ _Mananasi__ is good friend to have.”

 

“I… Oh…”  The choked tone of Honey’s voice captured will the feeling Sharla had about it too.  She was almost immediately near tears. That was so intensely sentimental.  After a few more moments of walking, the badger spoke in barely more than a whisper.  “Thank you, Motti.  It… means a lot to me…”

 

After a moment, Sharla spoke up to answer her own curiosity.  “So… Does Motti have a name too, then?  I mean, did your friends give you one?”

 

“Motti __is__ name friends gave to me,” she answered.

 

“What’s that mean?” pressed Honey.

 

“Is pattern of Motti’s fur,” she responded frankly.

 

“That seems a pretty… generic name?” offered Sharla, hoping it wasn’t an insulting observation.

 

The hyena answered in the same casual-sounding tone.  “Motti friends were Lycaon… painted dogs.  Motti is only one in group with this fur.”

 

“What was your name before that?” came the next question from Honey.  Sharla would have asked if the badger had not.

 

“Parents has name for Motti of Zakiah.  It is older word meaning pure.  No one call Motti that now though.  Even parents use name their daughter want.”

 

A single light was visible in the distance.  The sheep recognized it.  It was the train platform.  The misty rain had mostly abated so some of the chill in the air was gone.  Sharla sat down on the bench under the light, feeling a little safer.  Not being able to see at all was pretty alarming, even if she was travelling with a couple of mammals who could probably take down a rhino if they had to.

 

“We’re a bit early, so we just wait I guess?” the ewe suggested.

 

“Yes,” Motti replied, sitting beside the sheep.  Honey sat on the other side of the hyena.  

 

Another lingering silence passed, and Sharla spoke again.  “Motti?”

 

“Yes?” she asked.

 

“Why didn’t you return to The Interior?”

 

“Motti’s home is here,” she answered confidently.  “When Shetani come, Motti’s family is missing… maybe dead.  Village Motti is from, they give up and do not try to help because it is dangerous.  Before… Ukweli, he try to help and he is missing too, and still, Motti village is doing nothing to help.  It is too dangerous.”

 

“I’m… so sorry to hear that…” Sharla half whispered.

 

“Then, Shetani arrives in Siri Shamba, Motti village.  She has Ukweli with her, but he is only ashes.  Mammals behind “Cudspiracy’ kill him and burn him like evidence.”

 

“Who was… Ukweli?” inquired the sheep in a very withered tone.  She already suspected.

 

It was Honey who answered softly.  “Motti’s adopted brother.”  Sharla gritted her teeth, clutching the mostly melted bag of ice.  It felt appropriate that her jaw hurt as she considered that.  Of course she got punched out.  She was so __awful__ to Motti.  Sure she had been hurting at the time, angry and anguished, but she couldn’t allow herself to be so inconsiderate, as if no one else had ever been in pain before.  Sharla really had been selfish.

 

“I had no idea… I’m so sorry, Motti,” whimpered the ewe.

 

“Motti know you do not mean it.  Is why you only get hit one time.”

 

“Thanks,” responded the sheep.  “The rest of your family though… Judy helped them?” asked Sharla, trying to remember.

 

“Yes,” answered Motti, appearing to snap out of a bit of a daze.  It was probably pretty painful for her to talk about.  It hadn’t been terribly long ago.  The hurt was still fresh.  It suddenly made so much sense why the hyena decided that Sharla needed help.

 

“I.. I’m so sorry that happened.  I… Did they… did they __catch__ the one responsible?” the ewe half-whispered.  She dreaded finding this out… but had the one who killed Ukweli been a sheep?

 

“He will hurt no others.   _ _Mlinzi__ make sure of that.”  There was a stern nod from the hyena.

 

“ _ _Mlinzi__?” the sheep repeated.

 

“Vivienne,” Honey replied.

 

“What?  Wait, Vivienne Wilde stopped Ukweli’s… killer?”

 

“You saw the video,” Honey reminded her.

 

“That… That was the one who…”  Sharla felt a little sick.  Of course it had been a sheep.

 

“With the same weapon you saw in the video. Yeah,” murmured the badger.

 

“I… I am so… so sorry…” croaked Sharla.

 

“Do not mourn Ukweli,” instructed the hyena.

 

“What?” Sharla returned.  Was it… because she was a sheep?  She hadn’t the right?

 

“We do not mourn heroes in Siri Shamba,” Motti insisted, “They live forever in story.  However…”  She leaned against the sheep a little.  It was actually pleasant.  The larger mammal was throwing off plenty of warmth.  “I bring this up because… In Siri Shamba, when Motti’s family is hurting everyone turn away.  But… in in New Reynard…  Mammals who do not even know Motti do more.  Honey stay with us in hidden room in the Bed and Breakfast to protect us when sheep came to burn the house down.  Badger friend would die for Motti that day.   _ _Janga’s__  mother, she uses arrow to stop Ukweli’s killer, who means to kill Motti too.   _ _Mlinzi__ mean to kill this mammal.  In New Reynard, mammals will die for Motti.  Mammals will kill for Motti.  Home is here.  New Reynard is Motti’s village.  Always.”

 

Sharla took a moment in silence to really digest that.  Judy’s mate had helped her free this mammal’s family.  They nearly died in the process.  Vivienne Wilde, who the ewe had been so cruel and unfriendly to, had stopped the one who killed Motti’s brother.  The sheep lowered her head, cupping her muzzle, unable to stop the tears from forming.

 

“You didn’t know,” Honey reminded her.

 

“Do not mourn,” Motti insisted.

 

“No, it’s not… it’s not that…” sniffled the sheep.  “I’ve… made a terrible mistake… I was so awful to them.  I know I lost a friend… I didn’t know how many others I cost myself… the chance of ever even knowing.  I regret all of it __so__  much.  I was so wrong.”  She wiped her eyes.

 

“Is okay to be wrong.  Motti try to kill Janga when we meet.  He forgave.”  The hyena nodded.

 

“Attempted murder might have been more forgivable than the awful things _ _I__ said, Motti.”

 

In the distance, Sharla could hear the rumble of an approaching late night train.  The hyena put a strong arm around the shaking sheep.  “Is okay, _ _Kuanguka__.  Hard day is ahead, but you still have friends at the end of it.  Motti promise to you.”  


	5. Deerbrook

 

****Sheepless in New Reynard** **

_ _Chapter 5:  Deerbrook_ _

 

 

 

The soft listing of the train as it went around a curve is what woke Sharla.  Her face had been pressed against the cool window of the car, the winter air rushing outside the moving train keeping that pane of glass icy.  It helped her face.  She forgave the hyena for decking her after everything she’d said.  The ewe had lashed out at Vivienne over anger about her __own__  brother and it was for far less.  She understood the rage that accompanied it.

 

Sharla looked across from her.  Motti and Honey were both asleep.  A nap after such a long night with an equally long day ahead of them was definitely in order.  Honey had slumped against her hyena friend who had a large, strong arm over her to keep her from falling away as the train moved.  They were close friends.  Judy and Sharla had been such close friends once.  While the sheep saw some glimmer of hope to resolve the loss of her brother, it pained her to accept what her callousness and anger had damaged or even destroyed in the process.

 

Perhaps someday she could fix it, but there was something important she had to do first.  She could not hope to salvage things with her former friend with all the weight she carried that moment in her heart.  Sharla gazed outside as she mulled over these heavy emotional burdens.  She could see very little.  The inside of the train car was only dimly lit with a soft red light.  It made it easier on nocturnal mammals, providing the luxury of not being blinded by bright lights when boarding the train.  Red lights always made Sharla sleepy, however.  

 

Based on how few trees she saw whipping by the dark window of the train, she imagined they were probably near Bunnyburrow, if not just beyond it.  Their destination was about 40 minutes by train to the south of the Sharla’s home town.  The sky had partly cleared, or perhaps they had simply travelled south of the rain, so stars peered through the cloud-littered dark sky.

 

“Too worried to sleep?” interrupted the badger’s soft, deeper voice.  Still feeling slightly sluggish from dozing, Sharla glanced back at her.  She was still resting against the slumbering hyena.

 

“I’m… anxious, I think?  Not really worried.  I’ve been through a lot the past 24 hours or so.  Honestly, I’m kind of emotionally numb.”  Sharla was forced to consider in a flitting memory all the things she’d endured.  She brought __most__ of that on herself.

 

“Nothin’ wrong with that.  I’m worried too,” answered Honey, dismissing the claim that her woolly companion was not concerned.

 

“I have trouble imagining you being worried or scared,” offered the sheep with a meek smile.

 

Honey looked out the window a bit wistfully.  “ _ _You__ worry about your safety.  And rightly so.”  Sharla tensed up at that point.  “Me however?  I worry about… disappointment?  Maybe I fear he won’t be like I’ve always imagined him, y’know?” noted the badger.

 

“Who?  The wolf?” asked Sharla.

 

“C’n I tell you a funny and personal story?” inquired Honey.

 

“I… I think so?” the black sheep responded.

 

“So… When Judy came t’ my place… with Jack and his lady fox…” began the badger.

 

“Wait, Jack __Savage__?” gasped the ewe.  “Jack Savage was __there__?!”  She knew Jack had been somehow involved in the Interior thing from social media, though the details weren’t really clear.  She also knew that the actor was with a fox now.  Surely she meant a different Jack though...

 

“Yep!  He was with Judy.  They did the Interior thing together!”  Honey gave a broad grin.  It was not widely known, so Sharla logically assumed telling her this linked the badger to that same huge story.  Honey was happy to get to play a part in it all, the overdue justice for the Interior.  Given what had happened, it was understandable… however, it left Jack’s involvement a mystery.

 

“He’s an actor, not a real action hero!” returned the ewe.  It’s why she dismissed his involvement even when the rumors started flying.

 

“I wouldn’t be so sure!” laughed the badger.  “Well, Skye, his fox sweetheart… It turns out she actually __killed__ some mammal out there… I heard the report they gave to the wolf ZBI agent.  I wasn’t supposed to hear, but I did.  But… Anywho, this story ain’t about Jack n’ Skye.  It’s about the ZBI agent who was stayin’ with us!  His interest in the case made me think…”  The badger took a deep breath.  “It made me think that, hey, he was working on cracking the ‘cudspiracy’. Front and center.”  Sharla lowered her head.  She wished it wasn’t being called that.  It made it way, __way__  too broad.  Honey pressed on with the apparent intention of preventing the sheep from dwelling on it.  “So… don’t laugh… I thought Richter, the agent, was actually Big Bad!  I could swear it was him.  I mean… He was a huge black wolf!  And he was dealing with a huge case related to all that… __A__ _ _nd__ we just got confirmation in the news conference and it was a huge deal!  Richter was in the middle of it, right there with us.”

 

“Wait, is this the same wolf that Motti was referring to when she said…?”  The ewe didn’t want to just assume.

 

“Oh yeah.  Definitely.  But, after what she was, ah… referring to… I started getting messages from Big Bad… the stuff about your brother being compromised, the tower falling, how monumental all of that really was…  Big Bad was disbanding our little group as the threat was crumbling and there was no need for any of us to be exposed to legal risk.  It was understandable, but this conversation… it was goin’ on while Bay was __asleep__ beside me.  It wasn’t him!  I felt so silly.  But… Big Bad told me to give the documentation to the ZBI only on the condition that I was provided immunity from any prosecution.  It was easier to give __me__ that, he said, because I was only in charge of hosting the information, not actually gathering it.”

 

“Why couldn’t he just give it to them himself?” suggested the sheep.

 

“It would implicate him in the __collection__ of this information.  I hosted it, but the actual collection was done in a… ah… ethically substandard fashion.”

 

“Ah.  Okay… corporate espionage.  I forgot.”

 

Honey hissed, “Don’t go droppin’ the ‘e’ word… we don’t know who can hear us!”  That served to remind Sharla that the badger was pretty paranoid.

 

“Right.  Sorry.  So… You haven’t met Big Bad yet… but you thought you had and you…”  Honey nodded slowly.  “…right.  So I guess you were attracted to him?  To Big Bad?” asked the sheep.

 

“Duh,” replied Honey.  “So… how that happened… I first encountered him in a text-based role-play kind of thing… Think tabletop like your brother did, but online.”

 

“Gotcha.  Nerdy stuff.”  The ewe laughed at the idea of the tough badger rolling die late into the night.  It tugged Sharla’s heartstrings hard as she suddenly realized that her brother wasn’t gonna be rolling any more 20’s.

 

Honey interrupted that introspection after a moment.  “Err… yeah… So, it was a fantasy kind of story, right?  He played this huge barbarian wolf, and I played … a magic user.  So… we played through a few campaigns and became closer and closer friends as time went on.  So, naturally, he found out about the work I was doing to expose the conspiracy.”

 

“What were you?” interrupted Sharla curiously.

 

“Huh?” returned Honey.

 

“Your character, I mean.  What was your character?”  Sharla was curious.  Her brother had characters in his game and she never bothered to find out more about them.  Now she wouldn’t have the chance.  It seemed somehow unkind that she’d never even asked, even if it wasn’t her thing.  She should have shown more interest in his hobbies.  He might not have felt like he needed to do it all alone.  He might have been safer.  There was no way to know.

 

“A cleric… a healer in that role-play world,” Honey replied after a short pause.

 

“I mean… were you a badger?” pressed Sharla.

 

“No,” answered Honey with an uneasy tone in her voice.  “Anyway, in some of our late night pushes into the campaign, when other players in our online group were not around… we got a little… better acquainted, if you get my drift.  All text, but very nice all the same.”  Honey nodded.  Okay, she decided she didn’t want more details about __that__.

 

“Were you a wolf?” Sharla verbally pondered.  That was important to her understanding of why Honey was nervous about this meeting.  Had she lied to this canid about her species?  It was understandable given the situation.  He shouldn’t fault her for that.  It was still the same mammal, after all.  It’s not like Honey was really a magic user, either.  It was all pretend stuff.

 

“No,” dropped the badger, “So, the intimacy was __really__ passionate, bordering on violence sometimes.  Really aggressive…” the badger further explained.  The ewe winced.  No, this was the part she __didn’t__ want to know about.

 

“A sheep,” responded Motti blankly.  Sharla hadn’t even noticed that Motti’s eyes had opened.

 

“Not her business!” snapped the badger.  “How d’you even __know__ about that?!”

 

“Drinking badger talks about these things!” stated Motti confidently, giving her suddenly struggling friend a tight bear-hug.

 

Sharla widened her eyes in immediate surprise.  “You… played as a sheep… intimately involved with a wolf?” That made literally no sense.  “Why?!”

 

“I wanted to get into the mind of a sheep!  It’s why I chose it!  And it helped!  Big Bad knew lots about sheep, and helped me play the character!  It’s not like I set out originally to get close to him as the __sheep__ , it just… That’s how it happened!  And it turns out it was fun putting this frantic little ewe into those crazy situations, alright?” protested the Honey.  “Anyway, it’s not really relevant here!”

 

“Wait, he’s expecting to see a sheep?” pressed Sharla anxiously.  “Oh you are __not__  going to try to pass me off as you!  That is so not happening!”

 

“No!” cried Honey.  She then ducked down some, lowering her voice to an exasperated whisper at her own advice from before.  “He thinks I’m a __wolf__ , dummy!  He wouldn’t have __needed__ to help me play a sheep character if I were really a sheep!”  The badger crossed her arms over her chest as Motti stopped hugging her.  “But he’s gonna know today that I’m not a wolf __and__  that I hacked his computer to find him.”

 

“How did hacking his computer give you his location?” Sharla bluntly inquired.

 

“His browser auto-saved information with the address where he was sending his pizzas.”  Honey beamed.  The ewe leaned back.  Okay, that was pretty clever.  She would never have thought to immediately look for that information.

 

“ _ _Why__ did you hack him?” asked the sheep.  “Did you not trust him at first?”  That would make sense to her.

 

“Oh no… I hacked him only like… a day before everything went nuts!” stated Honey firmly.  “See, it wasn’t about not trusting.  I was trying to find him because I cared about him, and if he or I were trouble, I was gonna go to him.  With the thing that happened to Swinton, I was really unsettled.  I needed to know I could find a friend if I needed one.”  Sharla nodded slowly at that, rubbing her chin and wincing.  Her face still hurt noticeably.  That was gonna last a while.

 

“Well, I honestly think he’ll understand.  And not being a wolf isn’t gonna matter.  It doesn’t matter that… who was it?  Skye?  It didn’t matter that she was a fox, right?  How they… feel…  God, I am such a jerk.”  Sharla lowered her head again shamefully.  Of course it didn’t matter.  It never should have.  Why was every part of this little ‘adventure’ in loyal service to reminding her of her biggest mistakes?

 

“Well, Jerk,” laughed, “We’re about to pull into our stop.  I hope you aren’t too tired.  We have a bit of walking to do before we get to that address.  It’s in the woods outside town.  Perfect place for the Big Bad Wolf.”  Despite how warmly Honey said it, the use of that name for a beast dwelling in the charming forests of Deerbrook County was actually kind of chilling.  This mammal had a lot to lose.  This could seriously be dangerous.  But, they were not alone.  They had Motti, and even a wolf would be hesitant to tangle with the lady hyena.  

 

The train pulled into a small station that was, if possible, even more distinctly simple than the concrete platform out in the forest in New Reynard.  It was literally a gravel patch in the grass with some wooden benches surrounding it and a single glowing streetlight.  One had a better scope of their surroundings here, however.  The rolling hills of the area made it feel more sheltered than the open field of the Bunnyburrow station.

 

By the time they’d arrived at the ‘station’, the colors of sunrise were beginning to bleed into the eastern sky.  They were traveling East.  The walk wasn’t unpleasant despite occasionally having to go up the random hill, but it was too quiet, and finally, Sharla had to speak up so she didn’t just fall asleep on her feet.  It had already been one of the longest nights of her life.

 

“Motti, if you don’t mind my asking… would you tell me a little about your brother?  What did you say his name was?”  She ticked faster on her hooves to catch up to the faster-walking hyena.

 

The larger spotted female smiled, seeming immediately glad to speak of him.  “Ukweli, yes.  He was younger than Motti.  Five years.  He was very little when we get him.  I was just turning fifteen, he was almost ten.  His home is burning but he alone is saved of his family.  He is adopted by Motti family.”

 

“Oh… So he was not your… I mean he was your brother, but not a blood sibling?”  Sharla hoped she’d not been offensive in pointing that out.  It was no less important a bond.

 

“No, he was not even hyena!” laughed Motti, showing she was not offended.  In fact, she was very cheerful to talk about it.

 

“Really?” asked Sharla.

 

“Truly.  He was lycaon.  Very pretty lycaon.  Such vivid patches.  Tall too, and such nice ears.  Scars on his back, but most never see them.  He was burned there.  He didn’t like fires.”

 

The ewe glanced away, mostly at her hooves on the lonely grey morning road.  “I’m sorry to hear he had that happen.  And then to… to be lost after that…”

 

Motti patted the sheep on the back heavily, almost making her stumble forward.  “He is hero now. This is good for him.  But he is missed.  I will always miss Ukweli.  Village sees him as my brother, but he was more to me, when no one is looking.”

 

Sharla snapped to attention.  Wait, what?  Surely that was not meant the way it sounded, but she was honestly not willing to ask for Motti to clarify.  The ewe discarded the thought outright.

 

“In the end he was remembered as more than even that.”  It was Honey that diverted the conversation.  “Becoming part of the endless story of your village is the greatest reward, yes?”

 

“Mananasi is listening!” laughed Motti.  There was an innocent joy in her voice that made Sharla dismiss the less innocent pondering from a moment before.  The pair seemed to compliment each other so well, the badger and hyena.  One was carefree and sunny, the other was paranoid and brooding.  From Sharla’s best reckoning, they hadn’t been together very long, but it would have been a cinch to believe that these two had been best friends since their earliest memories of youth.

 

“This is the entrance to that forest I was telling you about.”  As they had been walking, Sharla had been paying more attention to her hooves.  She had not realized, as they went over the top of the next hill, that a massive forest stretched before them.  It looked like a nature preserve in how pristine it was.  The road narrowed, suggesting that it was little more than a single driveway.  The trees were almost as dense as those that surrounded New Reynard.  It was dark.  A single wooden sign, run down and barely held to its post by rusty nails, clearly stated “Keep Out”.

 

This was exactly what a little lamb would expect a cursed fairy tale forest to be like. The ewe plodded even more slowly, as if some dark miasma were pushing her back.  Every strand of wool shorn close to her slender form felt almost electrical with fear.  This was what her prey biology understood right down to a cellular level as ‘a seriously bad idea’, and she was not stopping.

 

On the ground, just at the entrance of the forest, Sharla saw something that drew her attention away from the road.  She moved over to it.  Scorched onto a large mostly-buried granite rock were the words ‘Unsafe Woodland’.  She turned to announce this fact but found that Honey and Motti had stopped a good hundred feet back at the side of the narrow road.  She was rooting around in the pack she’d brought with her.

 

“Oh my God, were you guys just gonna hang back there and let me walk in first?!” shouted the sheep, clicking her small hooves quickly back over to her friends.

 

Honey chuckled, “No, nothing like that, I didn’t realize you’d gone on ahead.”

 

Exasperated, Sharla hissed back, “What are you doing?  Did you bring a weapon with you or something?  There’s a warning that it’s not safe right at the durn entrance!”

 

“Here we go…”  Honey took out some kind of fabric from the bag.  It was deep crimson.  The ewe stepped back as her badger companion wrapped it around herself.  She fastened the clasp under her neck and adjusted the garment slightly.

 

“You have got to be kidding!” snapped Sharla.

 

“It’s how he’ll know it’s me!” responded Honey confidently.

 

“There is no way in hell I am ever gonna follow you into __that__ forest with you dressed this way!”

 

“I don’t get it,” offered Motti.

 

Sharla rubbed her hooves down her blunt caprid muzzle.  “If you are correct, there’s a big sheep-hatin’ wolf in there!  Besides, Red Riding Hood was a little roe deer, not a badger or a sheep!”

 

Honey frowned.  “I ain’t explainin’ this one - It’s personal.”

 

Sharla openly blanched at that.  Yeah, she had all the information she needed right there.  What a deviant!

 

“Let’s go, then?” pushed Motti, apparently also not caring about the reason.

 

Her cape billowing with sudden motion, Honey laughed and skipped toward the forest.  Sharla sighed and walked close to her spotty traveling companion.  The ewe felt that at least Motti would immediately be defensive if they were confronted by the wolf, not drawn practically floating with hearts in her eyes toward him.  

 

The density of the forest provided a dark and foreboding feel on its own, but the morning had turned slightly breezy.  While the breezes did not ruffle fur inside the forest itself, the trees hissed and groaned and scattered sound that made it hard for her ears to pick up even the footfalls of her companions.  It made it impossible to know if they were being followed.  

 

Things were terrifying enough for Sharla.  She’d already been through so much stress.  She had just discovered that her brother was killed while doing something heroic, but even worse, he didn’t trust his sister enough to tell her what was going on.  He did it alone.  The darkness of the forest did nothing to lift the weight on her spirit.  She walked with a badger who was obviously crazy, dressed as a story-book character.  On her other side was a fearless hyena who had already punched Sharla in the face.  And Motti was __still__ the more trusted of the two.  It had been a good, honest, well earned blow to the head.

 

The quiet walk afforded Sharla time to consider the pure insanity of what she was doing.  She had offered to even do this alone.  If she’d been alone, Sharla was pretty sure she’d never have even ventured into the forest.

 

And that was __before__ she saw the skulls.

 

On either side of the road as they went around a bend where the trees were most dense, as if to focus attention on them, were two clean, white skulls.  Right above the skulls was a sign that looked like it was written in old, dried, dark blood.  It said simply:

 

‘ ** _ ** _Too Late_**_** ’

 

Suddenly, it didn’t even matter that she had two strong mammals with her who could protect her.  Sharla wanted to run into the sun itself to get out of this darkness.  She backpedaled a few steps into Motti’s front.

 

“That’s not a good sign,” Honey murmured in a heavy breath, pulling her cloak a little tighter around herself.  It was very literally an awful sign.  

 

Sharla shook her head slowly, speaking a bit hoarsely, “Sheep.  They’re… sheep skulls.”  Her blood felt like ice, both in how cold it felt in her body, and how hard it felt like her heart had to push to move it through her veins.

 

“Is either one Gareth?” asked Motti in an emotionless tone.  It struck Sharla how barbaric it felt to drop such a question, and that it was the hyena’s immediate thought.  How hard __was__ life in the interior?

 

“N… No, they ha-have horns.  My brother d-doesn’t.”  Sharla was battling hyperventilation.  She had never been more consumed by abject horror as she was in that dark, hissing forest staring at the two skulls on the ground.

 

The lady hyena moved over to the spot where they rested and picked one up.

 

“Motti, no!  It’s a crime scene!” cried Sharla.

 

“She’s right,” agreed Honey warily.  “You don’t want to-”

 

Sharla sucked in a breath that felt like lead in her lungs as she watched Motti put the skull in her mouth and bite it.  The sickening scraping noise made the sheep’s legs like soft butter.  Down to her backside she went, right onto the little road.

 

Crunch.  Scrape.  Tack tack tack.  Motti bit and chewed upon the caprid skull.

 

“Guuuhhh…” Honey’s eyes were impossibly wide at the actions of her hyena friend and her annunciation was about as good as Sharla would have managed if she could even breathe.  Sharla’s vision went fuzzy.  She shook her head to keep from fainting.

 

Motti took the ill-fated sheep head out of her wide, dangerous maw.  “Skull is not real.  It is for play.”

 

“What?” squeaked a legitimately terrified-sounding badger.  “It’s fake?”

 

“Smelled wrong for bone.  It is not.”  She showed the bite marks to her friend as Sharla struggled back to her feet.

 

“Are you … are you sure?” begged their wooly companion.  Upon cautious inspection, she found it to be true.  The scrapes were a different color.  The white color was painted on.  Underneath was a darker material.  It might have been plastic or something.

 

“Good work, Motti,” congratulated Honey.  “You have solved that mystery and made it so I probably won’t ever sleep through the night again.”  She patted the hyena on the back and moved over to the other skull, picking it up and putting it in her backpack.  Sharla shuddered at that.  Would that end up gracing a shelf in the bed and breakfast now?  What a terrible idea!

 

The sheep gasped as she heard a loud thwack in the distance.  It wasn’t even evident who moved first, but all three travelers were immediately bunched tightly together in the middle of the road.  Motti threw down her chewed up skull as if not wanting to be caught stealing or something.

 

Breathless, they listened.  It didn’t sound like a natural sound.  A few moments passed.  No sound.  Even the wind seemed to have let up.  It was so dark in these woods.  It could be almost nightfall and they would not know it.  This place had a feeling of timelessness.  It was still and silent, and for a brief moment, Sharla felt like maybe they only heard a limb falling or something.

 

But finally, the sound was heard again.  And again.  Then it was heard yet again.

 

“Chopping wood.”  It was a whisper from Honey that clarified the sound they were hearing.  Sharla had to agree.  It was definitely that.

 

“Who else lives here?” whispered Motti.

 

“Past the threatening signs and the skulls of sheep?” pointed Sharla.

 

Honey hissed back excitedly.  “Right.  Only Big Bad.  Has to be.  And… he’s chopping wood.  With a huge, scary-looking axe… Oh God… Dark, strong… shirtless, I bet… Just… Just like in my dream…”  Her voice sounded cautious at first, but by the end of that statement she sounded like she was near tears with joy.

 

“Wait!” Sharla shot back anxiously.  But Honey was already moving forward at a near jogging pace into the darkness beyond the skulls.

 

“Badger is happy,” expressed Motti, nodding.

 

“Badger is crazy!” Sharla groaned back, striding after her.  “Dear God, I’m crazy too!  Wait!  Stop!”

 

“We is all crazy!” laughed Motti, and she ran along to catch up with Sharla.

 

Three crazy friends ran into darkness, hope, and doubt.


	6. Wolf

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have to admit, I might act the same as Honey if I had the chance to see someone I was personally close to like she was with Big Bad.  But, that said, anyone who is terribly close to me will tell you that I have not historically demonstrated a rock solid self-preservation instinct.
> 
> If you are just joining this series for the first time this story is in the continuum AFTER Season 2, so you will definitely want to read Thanks for the Fox and Guardian Blue Season One and Season Two for important context, you may also want to read Winter Hearth for important causal background.
> 
> I want to take a moment to thank everyone for their patience.  Things are absolutely getting better, but these things don’t just happen because we want them to.  I am having to work very hard.  It will get easier, but I have not had a day off in a very, VERY long time.  But my financial troubles are over.  We can move forward confidently now.  As time allows, I will get back to doing the things that I really, really love.  
>    
> Fortunately for you, that’s this!
> 
>    
> 
> Also!  A HUGE shout-out to J. N. Squire for assisting with editing this series!  It’s a dirty job, but someone’s gotta do it.  Thank you!

 

****Sheepless in New Reynard** **

_ _Chapter_ _ _ _6_ _ _ _:_ _ _ _Wolf_ _

 

 

 

Absolutely nuts.  This whole situation was out of control and Sharla was running headlong into it like a barn fire.  She felt the strikingly familiar hard squeeze in her chest that came along with mortal fear.  That made running after the crazy badger a lot harder.  She could barely breathe from the anxiety of the moment.  It was a dark forest.  In this section at least, the trees were evergreen, so even in winter it was foreboding and dark in this place.  There were scary signs.  Oh, and not to forget:  sheep-skulls.  Even if props, they were set out to make Sharla’s fate very clear in this chosen series of events.  What other proof did the sheep need that her life was in danger in this foreboding place?

 

She stopped, leaning forward and panting, trying to get her breathing under control.  It was more from the fear than the running.  She felt like she was being suffocated.  She held her shaking knees.  She couldn’t even hear Honey running anymore.  Motti was nowhere to be seen, but that didn’t suggest much.  Her larger friend barely made noise when she moved anyway.  The hyena was like a ghost.  As Sharla leaned over to try not to get sick from fear, her eyes focused on something on the forest floor.

 

Using her hoof, the ewe shuffled the leaf-litter to the side.  

 

…and the shivering sheep found beneath it the most enormous lupine paw print she’d ever seen in her life.  

 

Sharla went to her knees.  She put her hands down on either side of the impression and then brought her measured digits up in front of her face.  This wolf’s paw was almost the size of her head.  As a teacher of the second grade, identifying different mammals by their paw prints was actually part of the lesson plan, so she knew a wolf print from one of Motti’s rather large paw prints, and this was still larger even than Motti’s print would have been.  It was a wolf, and it was impossibly large.

 

“Motti?” the sheep called cautiously, trying not to be too loud.  She immediately didn’t want to be alone anymore.  ‘Big Bad’ was not a completely pretend name, at least.  And if the big part was true, then…  There was a shuffle in the forest behind her.  She turned.  A shadow was seen, and it was moving.  This was it.  She was found.  This monstrous wolf made it clear.  Hopeless were the sheep in his domain, and Honey and Motti left her to die.  She turned to run and thumped right into a large form.  Sharla cried out, falling back onto her rump.  She looked up, fearing the doom about to befall her but daring to see anyway.

 

She puffed out a sigh of relief.  It was Motti.  The sheep cast a glance back to the forest where she’d seen the shape.  There was nothing there.  Her mind, reeling in terror, was playing to every single worst imagining and fear she had.  That had to be it.

 

“Badger in love is not as slow as she looks,” explained the hyena in a defeated tone.

 

“I thought you guys left me!” whimpered Sharla, “There’s a giant freaking paw print here.  This wolf’s bigger than you are, Motti!”

 

“I not leave you.  Where is print?” asked her spotted friend.  Sharla got up and looked around, then groaned.

 

The paw print had been replaced conveniently by a sheep’s butt print.

 

“I sat on it.  Sorry.  Maybe there’s another…”  She shuffled about, but wasn’t even sure she could remember what direction the print had been pointed.  “It was like this!”  She gestured the size and Motti straightened up a bit.

 

“Wolfs are not getting so big.  Not like that.  Maybe this?”  She pushed Sharla’s hands together a pretty big margin.  

 

“No.  Like this.”  she framed her head.  “You gotta believe me.”  Sharla was to about to argue with Motti though.  She needed her to understand the danger and react appropriately.  And by appropriately, that meant exiting the forest post haste.

 

“Honey will be very happy.”  Sharla stumbled, staring at Motti with jaw agape.  No!  Not the appropriate reaction.  The hyena began walking.

 

“Wait, we don’t even know where she is!” hissed the sheep.

 

“Her smell is this way,” explained Sharla’s only possible defense from wolf-related demise.

 

“I can’t smell anything but wet leaves!” complained Sharla, falling into step behind Motti.

 

“Badger is smelling happy.  Motti can follow.”  And Motti seemed perfectly cheerful about this prospect.

 

“We need to get out of here, Motti.”  Sharla resorted to a pleading tone to make perfectly clear her level of fear.

 

“I would not leave sheep, what makes you think I leave Mananasi?”  And Sharla hated herself again just like that.  She sighed and nodded.

 

“I’m sorry.  Of course we wouldn’t just leave Honey.  I… I’m scared.”  She hated admitting that her fear would have caused her to abandon her friends, but it really nearly did.  If she didn’t crash right into Motti she might already be leaving this forest.  What a lousy friend she was.  Motti seemed to immediately understand the change in mood and stopped.  The hyena turned around, kneeling to be eye to eye with her woolen companion.

 

“It is okay to be wanting to survive. You have reason to be afraid.  Motti cannot say she would __feel__ differently.  Not a sheep, though.  But…”  Motti looked down a bit, seeming slightly despondent as well.  “Shetani… nearly dies because Motti runs away with family.  It was hardest ever choice.  Wanting to stay to help Janga and Shetani, but only Motti is knowing where the safe place is… where we are to meet help.  It was right choice, but some of the time, choosing right is feeling wrong.  Surviving is not bad way to be wrong.”  

 

Sharla found herself immediately distracted from her own fear.  How could she keep forgetting that this mammal was from the Interior and involved in that mess Judy and Nick had dealt with?  There were still precious few details about the massive investigation that ultimately lead to the demise of both of their brothers, but Vivienne Wilde really had sent Sharla to the best mammals possible to help her.  It was as clear a revelation of that as there could be.

 

“How many… mammals did Judy save out there?” asked the sheep with a soft tone of regret.

 

“All of them,” came a deadpan answer.

 

“I messed up my friendship with her so bad.”  She began walking behind the hyena again.

 

“Friendships can be messy and still be friendships.  Motti tries to kill Janga when we meet the first time.  You make less noise now and not worry.  We all be okay.  You will see.”  She smiled back at Sharla reassuringly.  The sheep took a deep breath and then took out her phone, using it to add a little more light and try to look for more giant paw prints.  As she did, she noticed that she had an email icon.  

 

Checking messages, emails, notifications… that sort of thing becomes habit.  Without even thinking, Sharla opened it as she shuffled as quietly as she could behind the sniffing hyena.  It was an email from Judy.  Sharla immediately opened it.

 

__Sharla,_ _

__

__I hope you get this before you get to New Reynard.  The badger lady you are being sent to see needs to be approached with_ _ **_**_healthy respect_ ** _ ** __.  Honey can be… extreme._ _

__

__Regardless of what you did and said, I don’t hate you.  I know you are going through a very bad time right now.  I won’t demand you ever ‘like’ the life I lead, but I promise you that I really am happy._ _

__

__Please let me know you are safe.  With what you are going through, I really am worried._ _

__

__\- Judy Wilde_ _

 

The sheep peered at the words and felt hope bubble in her, even with the dark, chill gloom of the winter forest and threat of being torn apart by it’s massive occupant.  It didn’t matter that she promised Vivienne that she’d leave Judy alone, it was the bunny’s choice to be Sharla’s friend, and reading that letter, she still was.  Things were still salvageable.  She smiled and began ticking away on her phone to email Judy back.

 

She wanted to keep it short, given the circumstance.  She wanted only to say, ‘I’m fine.  I don’t need you to worry about __me__  after how I acted.  I’ve made some new friends in New Reynard and we searching for my brother together.  Thank you for checking up on me.  We’ll talk soon.’  That’s really _ _all__ she wanted to say.  

 

However, she only managed to type the first six words of it before Motti put a paw out to stop her mindless forward shuffling.  The sheep realized that the reason she did this was because they had come into something of a clearing and there was a cute little cottage in the middle of it.  They had found what was possibly the lair of the Big Bad Wolf.

 

“It’s so… quaint…”  Sharla stuffed her phone back into her pocket, forgetting to even turn off the screen.  

 

“It is a house,” Motti pointed out.

 

“Yeah, but it looks like a fairy tale house,” whispered Sharla.  The grass in the clearing was pretty tall up to about half an acre around the house.  Inside that half acre was a short stone wall, only about chest-high, and the grass was short and neat inside of it.  The cottage was made of grey stone and dark wood.  The tall, angular roof was thatched with tightly woven reeds and grass, still green in places as if it had recently been re-done.  The windows had no glass, but had curtains and appeared to have been repaired at some point in the recent past as well.  That didn’t help separate the feeling that this whole forest was the living source of the story that Honey had dressed the part for.  Someone definitely lived here and the trio were trespassing in direct violation of the signs!    “Do you see anyone?  Hear anyone?”  The sheep regarded those rounded hyena ears.  Motti had to have better hearing than her.  The large lady hyena stood suddenly bolt upright.

 

“Motti hears struggling.  Other side of house.”  She began moving forward, into the clearing.  “Honey.  Honey is struggling!”  Motti broke into a run.

 

“Oh for fluff’s sake!” cried the sheep, bolting behind her friend.  This would be it.  A fight.  Honey was fighting and she was about to get all kinds of backup.  

 

They rounded the corner, toward the back of the house, Sharla preparing herself to see some dark beast tearing up her badger friend, but she and Motti skidded to a halt as they took in the actual scene.

 

Honey was upside down, suspended about a meter off the ground by a rope.  She had been, by the look of it, caught in a snare by both feet.  There was a simple pulley up on a wide bough above the distressed badger that attached to another pulley on a higher branch where a bag of large stones had been tied.  That bag now rested heavily on the ground and the rope it was tied to held Honey wriggling and growling.  Her crimson cape was just barely touching the leaves under her, hanging down, her hood framing her anxious face.

 

“Honey!” Motti called as she approached.

 

“Careful, I don’t think-”  The badger didn’t get to finish her statement.  Fwip!  Up went Motti.  The stones barely managed to touch the ground, the hyena considerably heavier, but it still held her more than three feet up, a bit higher than Honey, but more or less beside her.  Stretched out, Motti’s paws could at least reach the ground, but it didn’t really help her in any way.

 

“A second trap.  It is for catching helpers.  Is clever,” Motti complimented evenly, hanging casually upside down.

 

“This is bad,” Sharla groaned under her breath as she very carefully ventured closer to her friend.  She didn’t see any trip wires or traps that were obvious, but she hadn’t seen the one that got Motti either.

 

“I know this is bad!” hissed Honey, “I can’t let Big Bad see me like this!  It’s embarrassing!”  Sharla rolled her eyes at that.  

 

“I’m pretty sure you should be feeling something else!”  Sharla made her way to the bags of stones.  The knots in the rope there were pulled too tight for her to undo them by the weight of her friends.

 

“Go in the house!  There’s probably a knife or something!” grunted Honey.

 

“Oh.  Yes.  Break into the monster’s house,” stated Sharla frankly.  “Why didn’t I think of that?  Oh, that’s right, because it’s suicide!”  She hissed the last part.

 

“You do not fare any better outside the house with friends being ornaments.”  Motti’s carefully chosen words hit their mark.  Sharla’s best chance was to get them down quickly.  She gritted her teeth and went toward the back door.  Maybe there would be something she could use outside.  That’s right, they heard someone splitting wood.  There was a wood pile.  It seemed to suggest that the neat little chimney on this adorable cottage was not just a decoration.  There was a large stump, and there was some freshly split wood.

 

Sharla’s blood ran cold.  There was fresh split wood, but no axe.  Whoever lived here had just been in this back yard, and now they were not.  And worse yet, they had an axe.  By the size of that paw print he didn’t even __need__ it.  He could probably pull a sheep in half with his bare paws.  The fear in Sharla ebbed a bit in the face of another thought.  Her friends were just whimpering pinatas right then.  They would have been helpless against an axe-wielding assailant.  She made a beeline to the back door.

 

It was actually slightly ajar.  She cautiously pushed it open.  It was pretty dark inside the house.  There were no lights.  It looked like it had not been designed with electricity, but there was, on a coffee table as she walked in, a charger for a laptop, from the type of connector she saw.  So there had to be a generator or a solar panel or something.  Two lanterns were there from what she could see, but she didn’t have a way to light them, so noticing them was just more of a realization that this house was cut off from the rest of the world.  How did Big Bad order pizza from this place?  Maybe he met the horrified delivery guy at the entrance to the forest?  Maybe he was a good tipper.

 

The sheep could smell paint and cleaners in the little cottage, again giving the impression that it was being taken care of.  It was absolutely not abandoned.  Sharla was breaking in.  She was trespassing.  Anyone here would have every right to confront her, or even harm her for wandering around in their home.  She found what she was looking for.  It was a single small, clean knife in the sink.  She saw a sink, but no tap.  There was probably a well nearby.  It was so utterly rustic!

 

“Sorry… sorry…”  She picked up the knife.  This was stealing.

 

Judy was a cop.  Sharla was just breaking all kinds of laws.  It was wrong.  How could she face Judy and tell her she did this?  The sheep put the knife down.  No.  She would find another way to get her friends down.  She turned to walk back through the two rooms of the cottage she was exploring, but before leaving the kitchen she saw something out of the corner of her eye that made her nearly forget her friends hanging upside down outside.

 

She saw herself.

 

Not a reflection, a picture.

 

What was more alarming is that it was a picture of her as a lamb.  Judy was in the picture as well.  Sharla moved over to the counter and picked it up in trembling hands.  Why the hell would Big Bad have kept this?

 

Then she saw the box.

 

There was a box, just outside the beginning of the living room.  It had a few other things that were obviously items that belonged to her brother.  The box was just kind of carelessly left on the floor.

 

Big Bad must have taken them because he needed to make sure there wasn’t evidence among the dead sheep’s personal belongings.  Sharla went to her knees in front of the box, shivering.  It was not warm here as it was, and now it felt so much colder.  She took out a little clear box that had some dice in it.  She saw his sketch book that probably held only three or for fantasy drawings he did during his ‘I’m gonna be an artist’ phase.  There was his little set of soapstone files from when he was going to learn sculpting.  There was his copy of ‘Wolfess!’, an erotic compendium of lupine … Okay no, that was probably not Gareth’s.  Sharla dropped that beside the box.

 

Then there were more pictures at the bottom.  Pictures of her, her family, Gareth’s friends.  Under that, there were less… cheerful things.

 

There was a newspaper clipping of a story about a young wolf ‘trampled’ in a panic during the protests when the “Savage Mammal” thing was going on.  Sharla remembered the story.  The wolf was on his way to school.  He had no idea what the protest was even about, and, like high school canines sometimes did, thought it would be funny to start a howl from inside the crowd of prey since no one noticed him.

 

His recovery was long and painful.

 

Of course Big Bad would be angry at sheep.  He had every reason to care about that.  Yet, it barely even made the newspapers at the time.  It went under in the absolute avalanche of muzzle commercials and fox-away ads.

 

There was another story about the wolf girl that was snatched by the crazed Darmaw.  She had started first grade, but had become the poster child for ‘stranger danger’, and her mother had gone to many schools to raise awareness about… well… awareness.  Get off your phone, stop recording, make sure you are safe first and foremost.

 

Another story was there.  This was actually several things stapled together.  Stuff about Judy finding Nick under the city.

 

That fox.  How stupid it had been to be so unkind about Judy’s happiness.  Sharla even saw the video herself… the one that wasn’t allowed to be shown on TV.  Back when she saw it, she only saw how incredibly strong and capable her friend was, and never for a moment considered __why__ she was that strong.

 

Of course she loved him.

 

Sharla met Nicholas Wilde because Judy loved him.  Its why he existed at all.  If Judy did not love him, that blood-soaked rabbit would never have risked her dream job to bash her way into the DEC to get her dead partner.

 

Sharla closed her eyes.  That, to her, was the moment where ‘who’ finally __really__  meant more than __what__.  

 

“Stay back!  I have chemical deterrent!” came a shout from outside the house.  It sounded like her badger companion.

 

The sheep bleated in surprise.  Oh no!  She was sitting there like an idiot with the box of her dead brother’s things and she wasn’t taking care of what she needed to do!  She didn’t even keep the knife because she was afraid of stealing.  Her friends where helpless!

 

“There, behind the tree!” came Motti’s voice.

 

“I can’t see, I’m facing the wrong way!” called Honey.

 

Sharla picked up the knife again.  She felt sick.  She feared less for herself and more for the terrible thing she might very well have to do in mere seconds as she headed for the door.  She could not let her friends be harmed.  Big Bad might spare Honey because they were friends, but there was no guarantee she’d even get to tell him if he acted quickly and decisively.  Sharla had to at least buy them a little time to explain things to him.  Honey being preemptively silenced by an axe just was not an acceptable outcome here.

 

Cautiously, the black caprid snuck out through the back door where she’d entered.  She could see her friends still hanging there, Motti peering at the tree-line.  Honey was unsuccessfully trying to wiggle to turn back around to see in that direction.  Motti could actually reach the ground because her large form was heavy enough to allow it, but only just barely.  Honey saw Sharla leave the house, however, and motioned to her.

 

“Git!  Git back in!” she hissed.  “Lock the doors!”  The ewe whined.  Honey had no idea the size of wolf they were dealing with and Motti apparently didn’t believe it.  They were about to find out, and the sheep was about to do the craziest thing of all.  She was going to run out there and help her friends with just her meek sheep butt.

 

Sharla remained as quiet as she could.  She needed to be able to surprise whoever was about to approach her trapped friends.  She glanced about, then pushed down behind the woodpile.  She could see her friends, and she could see the woods where they were fearfully watching.  At least, Motti was watching.  She seemed tense, but for that mammal to seem tense, it had to be fear, right?  The hyena spoke seriously.

 

“I can smell nothing.  It is too much smell.  It is… woods… clothing… I smell nothing.”

 

“But we both saw someone move around the front of th’ house!” panted the badger.  Sharla quaked where she crouched down.  She could run, but she would be leaving her friends.  She would also likely not survive even if she did.  Those paw prints.  The stride of a creature that size suggested it would thunder through the underbrush of the forest faster than the sheep could run on a flat jogging track.  

 

They said it was around the front of the house.  She __might__ have time to get one of them down.  It was unthinkable to even cast herself into the fight that way, but she had to do it.  For them.  They were doing this for her. They did it all for her.  That’s why they were even here.  

 

But who would be the best to get down first?  If she got Motti down first, she would likely immediately engage the wolf.  She might stand a chance, but she might also get badly hurt.  If she got Honey down first, the badger would more likely immediately try to get Motti down next, and that might leave Sharla exposed to attack instead.

 

This beast hated sheep.  That had been made clear.  If no one attacked him first, he’d surely go after the sheep before anyone.

 

However, if the wolf attacked Sharla, Motti and Honey might both be able to get free and fight back or escape.  

 

Sharla made her move.  She dashed across the back yard to the point where her friends were hanging.  She crouched down by the pile of rocks holding up Honey and began rubbing the knife frantically on the heavy gauge rope.  This looked way easier in the movies.

 

“Yes yes yes!  Hurry!” hissed Honey.  The sheep gritted her flat, useless teeth.  She was trying.  She was probably about to get torn apart, but she was doing the right thing.  The last thing she did would be to help others.

 

Just like Gareth.

 

Motti called down desperately, “No, Sharla should be running.  Is not wolf.  I am not smelling wolf!”

 

“What __do__  you smell?” hissed Honey.

 

“Lanolin.”

 

“That’s me, Motti!” grunted Sharla, sawing away.  Where did Big Bad even get this knife?  It was useless!  Wait, he probably just cut everything with his razor sharp knife-like claws and four inch gleaming white saliva dripping __fangs__.  Sharla sawed faster.  “Cutting as fast as I can,” panted Sharla.  “Sorry… nng… this thing couldn’t cleave soft serve ice cream!”

 

“No, not Sharla.  Sharla is smelling clean.  This is not.”  The whispered tone from the hyena was so dark.

 

“Shit!” grunted Honey.  “We got freaking followed!  Why was I so careless?!  Of course someone was watching me!  They’ve probably been waiting for me to bring them here this whole time!”  She struggled.  Sharla’s insides pitched with sudden horror.

 

The Cudspiracy.  The ‘evil’ sheep were here.  Sharla suddenly no longer cared about the danger she herself was in; she brought this fate on her __friends__.  Now, the same mammals who got her brother would get them.  Honey had been right.  Going after her dead brother was a foolish risk.  Sharla was a fool, and she was gonna be the end of all of them.

 

And in a split second, typical prey fear shifted like a palm breeze cut by a strong northern wind.  Anger welled up that towered demonically over the meeker rage she’d felt about foxes days ago.

 

“Run!” Motti whispered pleadingly.

 

“No.”  Sharla growled with determination and continued sawing.  She was more than half way through the rope.  She wasn’t shaking.  She glanced back at the side of the house.  Would there be a couple of sheep?  A dozen?  How many would they send after what was obviously a key player in their downfall?  The earnest ewe clutched the knife tighter and the rope shuddered with the speed she sawed at it.

 

Her grim purpose had changed.

 

She was not just trying to get her friends down so they could face some unknown dark beast.

 

She wanted these goons to __lose__.  She wanted to drive another stake into the Cudspiracy and the best way to do that was with Motti and Honey on their feet to face it with fist or fang.  This was not just a chance to reclaim her brother.  It was suddenly an unexpected chance to make those who took him away from her pay dearly for it.  She’d never felt such resolve for anything in her life.  This was, to her, the most lucid moment of her entire existence.

 

The murderers.  The villains.  The conspirators and liars.

 

She stood against them with mere seconds to spare and a comically dull kitchen knife.  Her weapon would be the new friendships she’d made with these odd, crazy mammals.  Even if Sharla died, at least some of these sheep would pay the same price as the Shearer family.

 

“Can you tell how many?” whispered Honey.

 

“Only smelling one, but others maybe are near.  Maybe is watching from far away.”

 

“This is my fault…” Honey sighed.  “There’s probably… there’s probably just the sheep here.  They probably got him long ago and have been waiting for me this whole time.”  She sounded positively morose.

 

“No!” shouted Sharla, irritated that Honey’s will could fracture at that very critical moment.  She no longer cared about keeping quiet.  “There is a wolf!  I saw a paw print.  He’s freaking huge!”

 

Motti called back loudly, “She says she see it.  Motti did not see it, but Sharla is sure.”

 

“Sharla?”

 

It wasn’t Motti.

 

It wasn’t Honey.

 

Another voice, from by the side of the house.

 

The sheep turned slowly, eyes wide, heart still unbelieving.  Clutching her knife tightly in hand she peered over the tended lawn of the lovely cottage.  Holding an axe in both trembling hooves was a very lanky sheep with unkempt wool and rectangular glasses that he’d worn since middle school.

 

Sharla squeaked out achingly, “G-Gareth?”


	7. Severed

 

****Sheepless in New Reynard** **

_ _Chapter_ _ _ _7_ _ _ _:_ _ _ _Severed_ _

 

 

 

Time seemed to fall apart around them.  No one moved.  It seemed that even the wind quieted, but maybe Sharla just didn’t care.  Was it truly her brother?  It __couldn’t__ be.  If he’d been alive, he’d have contacted her at least.   _ _Somehow__.  She wanted to believe that he would.  Was he a prisoner here, then?  Was it for his own safety?  Did this sheep just look exactly like him?  Did it look nothing like him except for the glasses and her heart was so wounded and desperate that she couldn’t even tell other sheep apart anymore?  

 

This sheep looked like a pillow jammed into a shirt.  Little Sam’s comparison tumbled fleetingly back into her mind.  It could be any sheep, right?

 

Her mind was screaming with questions which formed a maelstrom that made it impossible to hear if there actually had been real wind rustling the trees.  Her body felt heavy and numb as she stared at this apparition before her, and the ghost stared right back.

 

“What’s happening?  Motti, what’s going on?”  Honey’s voice fractured the illusion that time had stopped.  The badger was still facing the wrong way, of course.

 

With the surreal silence broken, Sharla simply bolted.  She couldn’t help herself.  Her body moved practically unbidden.  Her brother dropped the axe.  He stood limp as a living room punching sheep while his sister threw her arms around him.  Then he got battered like that same effigy, Sharla pounding on his wool-padded chest and shoulders with tears in her eyes.  He just kind of took it.  He looked utterly numb as he stared back and forth in disbelief between the ewe and the ensnared larger mammals.

 

Motti answered her suspended, rear-facing friend.  “It seem maybe missing sheep is actually alive, but Sharla is fixing that.”

 

“Geeze, I wish I could see this,” Honey sighed loudly.

 

“Sharla I - ow - Hey, I…”  Gareth finally snapped out of it and tried to talk.  “Quit it, let me - geeze, ow!  Let me talk!”

 

“I went through absolute __Hell__ because of you, Gareth!”  Sharla pushed her brother, who stumbled back.  He managed to keep upright, though.  “I yelled at Judy… and her mate!  I rode a train all the way to New-freaking-Reynard!  Then I got drunk and punched out by a hyena!  Why the Hell didn’t you tell me you were okay!?  You really don’t trust me?!”  She pushed him again, tears spilling out finally.  It hurt.  He was alive.  This was wonderful, but it hurt!  She went through all of this, and for what?  He wasn’t even dead!  Surely he could have trusted her.  She wasn’t a conspirator, she was a teacher!

 

“Sharla, I’m not hiding from __you__ , stop!” Gareth finally shouted.

 

“Wait, the dead sheep?  Really?” asked Honey.  “Ohhhh…  This is a safe house!  I get it!  Hell yeah, I __knew__ that wolf was gold!”

 

“Then why haven’t you freaking __contacted__ me, Gareth!?” his sister fairly shouted.

 

Taking advantage of his sister’s unspoken truce for a moment, Gareth took a step forward, talking again, “There are very dangerous mammals after me.  Hell, I’ve even broken some laws.  I have a good __reason__ to be here.  You, however, do not.  It’s dangerous for you all to be here.  You gotta go!  And who the heck are these guys?  Are these your… friends?” he asked, moving toward the suspended pair.  “I don’t have to openly explain why that’s unexpected, do I?”

 

Oh.

 

Her brother thought she was…

 

Had she really looked so horrible, even to family?  She was traumatized by a fox!  She never came out and said she hated predators!  She not once said something she thought was truly bigoted around her brother.  Had she?  Did everyone see that in her?  Oh no.

 

“Motti.”  The hyena offered a paw.  It was a very awkward exchange as Gareth worked out how to grasp it upside down, thumb in the wrong place, way bigger than his, and shake in greeting.  “You left without telling sister.  You pay for that now.”

 

“No-!”  Sharla tried to prevent it.  It was futile.

 

He didn’t get punched, he got slapped.  But it was a Motti slap, and his unshorn pillowy form bounced twice before he came to rest.

 

Sharla looked at him a moment as he didn’t immediately get up.  That might have made her really angry at Motti if the ewe didn’t know why exactly her spotty friend did that.  Motti might have been able to save her own brother if he’d just trusted her and taken her on his dangerous journey.  Ukweli might not have died.  He left Motti all alone.  Whatever Ukweli thought of protecting his sister… his family… it did not protect them from the pain of losing him.

 

She took a deep, slow breath, then said evenly, “Thanks, Motti.”  The hyena quietly dangled, looking a bit regretful without being chastised.

 

“Are my glasses broken?” asked a sullen-toned Gareth, face down in the leaves.

 

“No, here…”  His sister retrieved them.  “C’mon, get up.  You didn’t have to __do__ this.  We could have talked.  Help me get my friends down.”

 

“Friends?  The ones that just beat me up?” asked Gareth.  He sat up, none the worse for wear.  It was a solid hit, but claws were spared.

 

“Yeah.”  The black sheep indicated her friends.  That is what they really and truly were.

 

Gareth sighed slowly.  “Sharla, I don’t think you understand what kind of trouble I’m actually in right now.  I’m hesitant even tell you anything about it because it could put you and your friends in danger too.  You have to understand.”  Gareth crossed his arms.  His sister was in no way accustomed to seeing that level of either resistance or confidence in him.  He was usually such a pushover growing up.  Still, to claim that she didn’t have any understanding was infuriating.

 

“I know what kind of trouble you’re in, dummy!” snapped the ewe.

 

“Do tell.”  Gareth narrowed his eyes shrewdly.

 

“You provided stolen documentation to a group seeking to expose the conspiracies surrounding the subsidiaries of Lanolin.”  His sister glared back just as shrewdly.

 

Sharla suddenly wished she had the presence of mind to snap a picture of Gareth’s face when she plugged the reason dead to rights.

 

“H-how do you…?”  He looked back and forth at the ewe’s friends.

 

“You were sloppy, Gareth,” explained Sharla.  “You left your name on some of the document requests that you gave to Big Bad.”

 

“How the hell do you know about Big Bad?!” cried the other sheep, back-peddling.  “Sharla, I don’t want you involved in all of this!  These mammals are dangerous!”

 

“Get my friends down and we can talk.”  Sharla worried that hanging upside down for too long might give them both headaches and walking home with a cranky headache-suffering badger would be the absolute worst.

 

“No,” Gareth dropped coldly.  “Tell me how you know about Big Bad right bleating now!”  He was borderline hysterical.  Was he protecting Big Bad?  Was it not the other way around?  That huge wolf print flickered back into Sharla’s mind.  He was big, but was he actually gentle and kind?  Was he afraid?  Was he in more trouble than Gareth?

 

It was Honey who answered.  “We helped the cause.  You can tell Gareth who I am,”

 

The male sheep huffed, shaking his hornless head in some hint of compliance. “That’s a start.  And why the heck are you wearing th…”  He stopped short, gritting his teeth tightly.  He stumbled back slightly as it appeared some significant realization hit him.

 

“This old thing?” asked Honey.  “I just had it laying around.”  She was obviously grumpy in how she said it.  It wasn’t being noticed by the right mammal.

 

“Where is Big Bad?” asked Sharla.  She was worried for Honey.  Was he okay?  Had it been the __wolf__ who got burned and not the sheep?  Had he died protecting Gareth, and now Honey would have another reason to hate wool-bearers until the end of time?

 

“You can’t actually be here.  None of you can be here.  How can you __be__ here?!”  Gareth was clearly beginning to freak out.

 

“Get me down before Big Bad gets here.  This is humiliating.”  Honey sounded less patient.  If she were facing the others, her eyes would probably have been ice cold.

 

Gareth spoke again, his voice soft and a little distant.  “Are you…  No… Only __you__ would have worn that…  I… I’m sorry.”  There was some silence.  Sharla’s stomach tightened up.  This was it.  Big Bad was gone.  He’d be a memory, and Honey would be crushed.

 

“W-what?” camed the badger’s wavering reply.  She turned her head as far as it would go to look over her strong, heavy shoulder at the lean, bespectacled sheep who stood, crestfallen behind her.  “He’s okay, right?  He has to be.  He was the strongest one.”

 

Gareth spoke, his lips barely moving.  “There is no Big Bad.  He doesn’t exist.  Not for real.”

 

“Uh… Yes he __does__.”  Honey’s statement was delivered in a growl.

 

“I uh… I’m sorry but…”  Hi expression looked fearful.  Why would he be fearful?  How could the leader of Honey’s entire movement not even be real?  Who had Honey been talking to that whole time?

 

Sharla felt a chill spike through her.  

 

“Oh…” the suspended hyena spoke first.  Her tone was dark.  She clearly understood what Sharla immediately dreaded.

 

There was a long pause, Honey looking over her shoulder at the sheep as best she could, eyes wide and fixed on the down-facing, apologetic caprid.  She stared at him a while, eyes tracking up and down.  Her expression was of disbelief at first, then growing abject horror.

 

“OH NOOOOO!!!” wailed the badger.  Sharla cringed at that as the full realization slammed into her.  Gareth _ _made him up__.  He created a ‘Big Bad’ persona to be the head of that whole operation with the knowledge that his character would vanish the moment he’d been discovered.  Unfortunately, it had gotten him very, very close to a certain mammal who was openly __hostile__ to sheep.

 

Gareth sighed despondently,  “I knew it.   _ _Moonsong__.  It’s really you.  But I thought you were a wolf!” Gareth criticized.  “How the heck did you even find me?!”

 

“Motti!  Hit me!  Please hit me!”  Honey sounded desperate.  Motti immediately took a swing but was inches short.  Sharla flinched at that.  Okay, that hyena might well do literally anything her boss told her to do!

 

“Cannot reach, Mananasi!” the hyena apologized loudly.

 

“Swing your rope at me!” yelled Honey.  She tried to swing herself as well.  Again Motti took a swing at the badger swung out of range.  They were out of sync.

 

“Who’s house is this, even?” Sharla asked, turning back to Gareth.  She had somewhat grown used to the insanity.  She could still see them out of the corner of her eyes.  A whiff and a miss again.

 

“It’s in my brain!  It’s in my braaaaiiin!” wailed Honey.

 

“Stop swinging, you going opposite of Motti!” her friend demanded.

 

“What?  Oh, this place?  It… It was abandoned.  I’ve been kinda… fixing it up,” Gareth explained, more obviously distracted by the display.  He shook his head and refocused.  “You still gotta leave.  I can’t be found.”  

 

“Almost got you that time!” Motti panted.  “So close!”  She swung back again, and Honey swung as well.  

 

“This is kind of hurting my feelings,” Gareth gestured to the antics of Motti and Honey.

 

The next pass, Motti very nearly violently connected with the badger.  However, Honey’s rope finally snapped.  Sharla had cut it quite a bit with the little time that she had.

 

“You’re dead, sock-butt!” boomed Honey, scrambling to her feet.

 

“Oh __shit__!” Gareth cried as the badger bolted at him.

 

Sharla moved too.  This was too much crazy.  Someone had to finally take control of this runaway train.  In a very uncharacteristic show of brute force, Sharla intercepted Honey on her way to Gareth.

 

THUMP!

 

Sharla brought her own skull to Honey’s side.  That was how sheep stopped someone.  And it was not a gentle push.

 

Down Honey went.

 

Hard.

 

There was silence for a bit, and then Motti spoke.

 

“You are needing new nickname.”

 

Sharla turned away from the badger and pled to her brother, now sitting, stunned, on the neatly trimmed lawn.  “Gareth, please come home.  We can work this out.  We can fix this, but not if you keep __running away__.”

 

“You just laid out a __badger__.”  Gareth scooted back some, putting a little more distane between himself and his perceived doom.

 

“It’s been a long damned day.  She’s fine,” grumbled Sharla.

 

“She was wanting this, really.” Motti explained, looking down at her sprawled-out friend.

 

“This is __insane__ ,” Gareth returned.

 

“Welcome to life post-Gareth!” snapped Sharla, gesticulating wildly.  “I wouldn’t be here flattening badgers if you had just trusted me and let me know you were okay.  Even just that you were hiding and couldn’t tell me anything else.  I just needed to know you weren’t __dead__  Gareth!”

 

“I know that badger!”  Gareth pointed at Honey.  “We’re both dead.”

 

“I’m still conscious,” groaned Honey on her back.  “Sharla’s still cool.  Her brother’s still mutton.”

 

“Don’t forget that you called Gareth ‘Sheep Deluxe’,” expressed Sharla, trying to remind her friend that he was still doing the right thing and helping when others would not.  He would not come home if he thought he wouldn’t survive the walk out of these woods.

 

Honey slowly pushed herself back up to a sitting position.  “Oh no.  You just took that title.  Gareth is now Sheep Doomed.”

 

“Well thank you!” chimed the ewe, trying to lighten the mood.  She thought hard about how to diffuse this situation.  What had he even done to Honey that was so bad?

 

Oh.  Oh yeah.  

 

Honey and Big Bad were romantically involved, to a point, right?  That meant that Honey… with a __sheep__.  Okay, yeah, her anger made more sense.  Sharla cringed inwardly.  The less she knew about __that,__ the better.

 

“Honey, I thought you were a wolf,” explained Gareth.  “It’s not like I was the only one who took on a separate persona.”

 

Oh no. It was more information.  Sharla didn’t want that.  He thought Honey was a wolf.  That was what Gareth wanted.  Did that mean that he was…  No, she wasn’t going to say a predophile anymore.  That was bigoted.  It was okay if he liked wolves.

 

She suddenly remembered the magazine in his box of personal effects.  Oh God.  He did.  He was totally into wolves.  Too much information.

 

But wait, it was __Gareth__ playing the wolf.  Honey played a sheep…

 

Sharla flinched outwardly this time.  This was __so__ messed up.

 

“I’m not talking to you, sheep.”  The badger was resolute.  At least it had gone from killing him to giving him the quiet treatment.  That was a bonus.

 

“Can Motti come down?” asked the hyena.  Sharla was distracted immediately as she marveled at how patient the larger mammal had been.  Gareth moved quickly over to the bag of stones.

 

“If you don’t hit me again.”

 

“Only if you are needing it,” Motti returned.

 

“Good enough,” he sighed.  It was about the best he could hope for, at least.  With a quiet sort of determination, Gareth began messing with the binding of the rope holding the bag of stones suspending Motti.  Sharla had already thought of that but Motti’s weight left it too tight, but hey, maybe he knew more about knots than his sister did.

 

Sharla blanched and looked away.  Damn it, Gareth.

 

He continued to talk.  “Since you know why I’m out here, you understand that it’s a terrible idea to leave, right?  I stole documents from the place Dad and I worked.  Obviously that was a one way street, right?  How am I supposed to come back from that?”

 

Motti answered frankly, “You supposed to take two lefts or two rights.  Motti is not licensed driver though, so maybe wrong.”

 

Honey cut in sharply.  “Have you been watching the news, ‘ _ _Big Bad__ ’?”  She growled the last part.  Sharla tensed a little.  It was gonna be a while before __that__ sting wore off.

 

“Of course I’ve been keeping up with it,” replied Gareth.  “I have my laptop here.  That’s how I was communicating with you.”

 

“With strangers, but not with your sister,” reminded Sharla.

 

“Don’t you get it?” asked her brother.  “You could have been __killed__.  We both still could be.  There’s documentation to suggest that there are conspirators in the ZBI itself.  They literally have a guy who makes witnesses go missing.”

 

“You mean Orson?” asked Honey.  Sharla wondered again if she was even legally allowed to hear this conversation.  It was an immediate reminder that they were big players in a very, very dangerous game.

 

Gareth looked at Honey with his head tilted.  His mood shifted.  He was focused and intense.  This was his life.  “I don’t have names, just indications, otherwise I’d have sent you the files.  What information do you have on ‘Lancer’?”

 

“’Lancer’?  Oh yeah,” Honey nodded.

 

“Definitely it is that guy,” Motti agreed.

 

“What, the sheep with the spear?” asked Sharla, remembering the video.

 

“Oh my God, you got my sister __involved__  that deep!?” cried Gareth.  “What the hell’s wrong with you guys!?”

 

“Lancer’s been taken out,” Sharla answered grimly, wanting her brother to realize it was not as dangerous as it might have been in the early days.

 

“What, the police got him?  I didn’t see anything on the news.”  He seemed a little skeptical, grunting as he pulled harder at the rope.  Yeah, not so easy, huh?  Sharla looked around for the knife and replied to her brother,

 

“I saw it with my own eyes, Gareth.”

 

The badger spoke up.  “He attacked my home while Judy was there with other witnesses from the interior.”  Honey sounded so proud as she said that.  Maybe the bite of finding out her lupine love interest didn’t exist was softened by the reminder that they still helped take down the conspiracy together.

 

“Wait, Judy?  Judy Hopps?”  Gareth seemed appropriately surprised.

 

“Oh,” Motti broke in.  “That is right.  She is growing up with Sharla and you also, yes?”

 

“Y-yeah…” Gareth answered, looking up from the rope he was still attempting to loosen. “Judy was there?  With you?”

 

“She was, yes.  Protecting the witnesses.  I’m sure you can understand why the full details of this didn’t make the networks yet.  They will in time, but they are still very carefully investigating who knew what and when.”

 

“Wow.  Judy.  Man, she’s really…  She’s really what she wanted to be when she was a kit, huh?  That’s awesome.”  There was a thump that surprised Sharla a bit, but it was Motti finally dropping from her rope as Gareth managed to loosen the knot enough to let her slip free.  She rested on her back a bit, probably to keep the blood from just rushing from her head.

 

“You have information about Orson, but do you have evidence?” asked Honey.

 

“We aren’t doing this right now,” cut in Sharla.

 

“Yeah, I have a damned ream of it,” he replied, ignoring Sharla.  “He’s the grandson of a council member.  Well… former council member.  Illegitimate, but he was cut in on a bunch of money to get him through school and get him in the ZBI.  His psychological evaluation was actually done by someone who isn’t even mentioned anywhere as an employee or contractor for the ZBI.  He was definitely a plant.”

 

“That’s your get-out-of-jail-free card, sheep.”  Honey moved over to help Motti up.

 

“That’s not guaranteed.” Gareth said.

 

Honey responded sternly.  “You can come forward with evidence, or you can get found with evidence and they can accuse you of withholding it when they eventually do find you.”  Sharla went rigid at that explanation, suddenly deeply appreciating Honey’s presence.  The ewe might not be able to convince her brother to come out of hiding on her own, but Honey really knew the right argument.

 

“Yeah?  Well, me being caught and getting out of serious trouble doesn’t spare my family from the smear it’s gonna cause.”

 

Sharla glared at her brother.“I’m enjoying the thought of a smear on the Shearer name a lot more than the __funeral__ that we __were__ planning.  Motti, quit that.”  The hyena had approached the other sheep and was pressing on his chest and back through his shirt, squeezing his whole torso to examine just how puffy sheep were.  It was not something Sharla was genuinely upset about, of course.  It was really a nearly uncontrollable response to mammals who were very tactile-focused.  The curiosity about what wool felt like was too hard to resist.  Motti immediately let Gareth go.  He did not complain, but he’d already been slapped silly by that same hyena.

 

Gareth finally sighed.  “Look, I’m sorry about all that, okay?  But there’s no promise I won’t be put in jail anyway, and if I’m there, who’s gonna protect me?”

 

“No one’s protecting you out here, either,” Honey gestured.

 

“I’ve managed to deter folks so far,” Gareth huffed.

 

“What, with fake sheep skulls?” demanded Sharla.  She stepped forward.  “Spooky warning signs?  Simple snare traps?  Impossibly huge wolf paw prints in the forest?  How long do you think that’ll work?”

 

Gareth crossed his arms, frowning.  “Look, I’m going with you, alright?  Honey’s right, better I approach them with evidence and a reason to hide than get caught with it without a reason.”

 

His sister smiled, giving a soft sigh of relief.  Finally.  Finally this mess could actually be over.  Life would never be the same, but at least it would still contain her wayward, geeky, dumb brother.  

 

He continued, however, “But, so you know… those snares caught two mammals just fine, didn’t they?  And the sheep skulls?  I think those are particularly fear-provoking!  I don’t know what you’re talking about with paw prints.  I didn’t make any prints, the leaves would just cover em anyway.”

 

“Wait, what?” returned Sharla.

 

“Paw prints?” Honey asked, suddenly very interested.

 

Motti answered.  “Sheep is finding one in the forest.  She says it is like this.”  The hyena held out her paws.  She might have exaggerated a little, but not very much.

 

“Yeah, no.  I’m the only one out here.  And that’s too big for a wolf.  He’d be like… seven feet tall,” Gareth explained.  Honey pulled up her crimson hood, a dopey grin from ear to ear.

 

“No, Mananasi,” Motti half-whispered.  “Is not the same wolf.  We have sheep, we go.”

 

“Gareth, are you __sure__ this house was empty?” Sharla asked, her chest tightening.  Why would her life not just finally calm down?  Motti began looking around frantically, as if the forest itself could descend upon them.  It did not make Sharla any less anxious to see her hyena friend fearful.

 

“I’ve been here for like… two months.  No one’s been here,” Gareth responded.

 

“Uh, sheeps?” murmured Motti.

 

“Yeah?” replied Sharla.

 

“We go now.”

 

“Why?” asked Honey, seeming to actually kind of snap out of a daydream.

 

Motti picked a tuft of black fluff off of the edge of the pretty freshly stacked woodpile.  She held it up, and declared ominously, “None of us is having long, black fur.”

 

Sharla pulled back her ears.  “Gareth, you idiot…”


	8. Fable

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Every time I take a step forward, Life likes to knock me two steps back. On the plus side, money’s not the problem, free time is! But, I am convincing some of the people and things around me to make sacrifices to give me a little of that time back and I am spending it doing what I love. Telling stories! I hope to maintain at least a two update per month schedule, so we shall see how it goes!
> 
>  
> 
> Also! A HUGE shout-out to J. N. Squire and my friend Alex for assisting with editing this series! Without them my ego would collapse in on itself!. Thank you!

 

****Sheepless in New Reynard** **

_ _Chapter 8:  Fable_ _

 

 

Sharla regarded the assortment of young mammals sitting before her in a wide semi-circle on the grass outside the school by the Munch field.  It was a warmer winter day, so this segment of class could be outside.  There were thirteen bunnies, two goats, a mongoose, two foxes, and one bobcat.  This was her class.  They ranged in age from about 8 to 10, depending on how their birthdays fell.  It was a fun age to teach.  They were very impressionable.

 

With smiles on their faces they prepared for the language arts portion of their day.  Second grade was full of new things, and Sharla had one of the finest records of any teacher in the Tri-Burrows.

 

Of course, she had wanted to be an astronaut.  That didn’t happen.  It wasn’t because sheep would make terrible astronauts.  It was because mice didn’t weigh anything.  It was all about saving delta-v.  Even neatly shorn and smooth, her remaining wool itself weighed more than the entire current crew aboard the space station.  Sharla would never go to space.

 

Judy had been only partially right.  Anyone could be anything, but there would always be competition.  While an appreciable number of bunnies had attempted to follow the example of Sergeant Judy Hopps, so far she remained the only bunny.  There was competition there, and only the best made it through.  Even in Judy’s graduating class, more than half the mammals in the academy either did not pass, or simply dropped out.  

 

But this, Sharla thought as she looked at the eager faces of her students, was what Sharla wanted to do now.  Now more than ever.

 

She cleared her throat, and then began to speak.

 

“Once upon a time, in a far away, quiet place, there lived a very tiny mouse.  And the very tiny mouse lived in a very tiny house.  And the very tiny house was in the smallest little village.  However, in this smallest little village, his was by far the smallest little house.  Because in this smallest little village, he was the only smallest mouse.  All the other mammals in the village were bears.”

 

The students all laughed at the idea of one mouse living in an entire village full of bears.  It was pretty ridiculous.

 

Sharla continued.  “One day, the little mouse went to look in the stream that cut through the center of the village.  He got too close to the edge, and with a sharp cry, he fell right in.”

 

“Oh no!” a girl bunny to the left cried.

 

“Rats can breathe under water,” stated the mongoose with authority.

 

“No interrupting the story!” one of the goats pitched.

 

“Rat’s can’t breathe under water,” another girl bunny added.  “Besides, he’s a mouse!  They’re different!”

 

“Nu uh,” replied the mongoose.  Sharla pinched the bridge of her snout.  Ah yes.  The downside to the second grade.  There it was.  

 

“Ricki,” she called over to the mongoose, “Rats can’t breathe under water.  They don’t have gills.  Some __can__  hold their breath for a long time, but that’s not the same thing.”

 

“Oh…” Ricki responded.

 

“Where was I?”

 

“Recess.” one of the fox kits announced.

 

“Recess?” Sharla replied, confused.

 

Almost all the kits cheered simultaneously and bolted in every direction.

 

Sharla stood where she was, staring down at the remaining pink-jumpered bunny and the bobcat.  They were best friends, and both absolutely loved story time.

 

“I cannot believe that I’ve fallen for that twice now,” murmured the ewe.

 

“You said the rat fell in the stream,” the bunny noted.

 

“Right… uhh… Yes, into the water went the rat,” Sharla stated.

 

“He was a mouse!” corrected the bobcat.  Sharla felt her eyelid twitch.

 

Right about then, three of the bunnies and both goats returned.

 

“Everyone ran.  Sorry,” one of them offered.  Sharla continued.

 

“The mouse fell right into the stream,” Sharla pushed.

 

“You said this part already,” one of the returning bunnies announced.  The Sheep closed her eyes a moment.  Would this have been easier for Motti, she wondered?  Would the hyena scare the children into focus?  In this age of electronic information, gizmos, games and noise, was there really a way to get through to them?  She took a deep breath, and again, continued.

 

“The mouse fell into the water, and then clung to a reed.”

 

“It’s clinged.” corrected a bunny.

 

“No, it’s clung.  It was a spelling word last week,” the bobcat noted.

 

“... clung to a reed,” Sharla forged on.  Sometimes you just had to press on amid intentional distraction.  “The water was cold, and it was moving, and the mouse knew that if he let go of the reed, he’d be swept far downstream and even if he survived, it might be days before his little legs brought him back to his home.”

 

“It’s so hard to be a mouse,” interjected a bunny.

 

“Perhaps as much as an hour passed as the mouse shivered and contemplated ways to rescue himself from his situation.  Finally, he heard a big, growly voice from over him.  He looked up to see that a bear had wandered to the stream and was standing in what was, to him, about knee deep water.

 

“‘Do you need help, little mouse?’ he asked of the poor thing.  The mouse was, despite living in a village full of bears, very wary of them.  He had not asked them for help before, and any time they dealt with him, they offered to pick him up, to bring things down, or in some way remind him that because he was a mouse he was helpless around them.  For some reason, on this day, bitter and shivering on his reed, the mouse refused to ask a bear for help.  If he had to swim to the other bank, he would do that to prove he did not need a bear’s help.

 

“‘Okay.  I shall be on the other side, waiting,’ the bear kindly promised.  He stepped out of the water to give the mouse a chance to swim.”

 

“Bye mouse,” stated the bobcat evenly.

 

“Insensitive!” chimed a bunny behind him.

 

Sharla cleared her throat to get eyes and ears back on her.  “As soon as he let go, the mouse was swept down the stream.  The bear, his long gait more than able to keep up, simply walked along the side of the stream at about the same pace as the mouse.”

 

“It must have been a really slow stream,” a bunny commented.

 

“Not to a mouse though,” informed Sharla, “Big mammals move fast in comparison because of their greater stride.”

 

“I heard mouse cars don’t even go as fast as I run,” added the bobcat.

 

The ewe nodded at that.  “That’s true.  Because of how light they are, they’d go flying when going around curves and the like.  Now… as I was saying, the bear followed alongside the river, and the mouse continued to try to swim to the other side, but the water was cold and the current made it so he kept being pulled away from the sides.  The bear followed for about ten minutes, and then got back in the water and scooped up the mouse.”

 

“Yay!” cheered the bunny in the pink jumper.

 

“I knew he’d get saved,” commented the buck beside her.

 

Sharla continued, “So, the mouse, shivering in a tiny ball in the bear’s huge clawed paw, sat up, sputtering and half-drowned.  He asked, ‘Why did you save me?  I’m not helpless.  Everyone keeps helping me and I haven’t been asking!’”

 

“He sounds ungrateful.  Put him back in the water,” laughed the bobcat.

 

“Elijah!” cried the pink-jumpered doe.  “That’s mean!”

 

Their teacher ignored that.  “The bear told him, ‘We do not help you because you are helpless.  We help you because we’re your neighbors.  Some of us are even your friends.  We help each other all the time, even if that doesn’t mean picking each other up out of the brook.  Perhaps, if it is your choice, we will help less in the little ways we do in town, but please do not ask us to choose not to help when you really do need it.  To ask that of your friends is the very opposite of kindness.’  The mouse thought about this, and agreed.  He had not been kind to push his friends and neighbors away when they wished to help.  Sometimes, the kind of help they offered was not the kind he wanted, but ultimately, that they wanted to help at all made them his friends.”

 

“It’s sad there were no other mice for him to be friends with,” the doe in the pink jumper verbally wandered.

 

Sharla wrested the conversation back again.  “The moral here, kits and cubs, is that there are those in your life who will always help you, and that is not a burden to them.  It’s alright to graciously, even proudly accept the help of those close to you.  They don’t help because they think less of you; they help because they think the most of you.”

 

“May we please join the others in recess?” asked Elijah the bobcat.  The bunnies were squirming somewhat as well.  Their teacher could tell when she had expended the attention span of her students.

 

Sharla nodded curtly at that.  “Thank you for asking politely.  We head back inside in fifteen minutes.  Get all your wiggles out before class.  Computer lab is next.”  What remained of her attentive second grade class dispersed and she stood up, stretching.  She wasn’t sore anymore, at least.  It had been almost a week since her little adventure to find her brother.  At least in her usual day to day life, things were starting to get back to normal.

 

Sharla began walking back toward the bleacher-side of the Munch field.  The surge in popularity of the kits game saw it being used a lot more, so the field looked nicer than it had for years.  Several of the other teachers were gathered there, keeping an eye on the frolicking students.  There was also… something strange there.

 

There was a wolf dressed in pantaloons and some kind of green doublet with a strange hat boasting a tall, proud feather.  This captured Sharla’s interest immediately.  As the ewe got closer, she could hear the twanging of what looked like a lute, and the laughter of the other teachers.  Why hadn’t they called her over there?  She was missing all the fun!  The sheep sped up.  As she arrived, two more wolves slipped out from behind the refreshment stand and grinned, both carrying an instrument.  A flute and a drum were held by the new canids.  They wore tights and tunics.  What in the world was this?

 

As the sheep approached, one of the other teachers, a lady deer, giggled and shushed the others.  All Sharla caught of the conversation was “… Here she comes.”  Her ears fell back.  That… was not a good sign.

 

She looked to the first wolf and he approached her, making the sheep tense up considerably.  She scolded herself inwardly, as he was smiling, and even wagging.  She knew what that meant.  She really had some work to do.  She smiled at the wolf, and, as he played his lute, he began to sing to her.

 

“Sharla, she’s on an excursion,

And in town she’s casted aspersions!

Oh what did she do?

She said he ain’t true,

My truth is the singular version!”

 

The other two wolves sang out right after the last line, “Oh her truth was the singular version!”

 

“What the heck?” she asked, eyes wide, looking at the other teachers.  More were gathering.  Why were these wolves singing about her?  What excursion?  What did she say wasn’t true?

 

The singing continued with the lute-playing wolf in the lead.  The manner of song and their outfit made them feel like something out of a medieval play.  The other teachers started clapping along with the beat of the drum, all having quite a lot of fun.

 

“We ain’t sayin’ this sheep here is dull,

Yes, we promise her head is quite full!

But say it ain’t so,

What she didn’t know,

Of a hero with bow-strings to pull!”

 

Wait.

 

“Of a hero with bow-strings he’ll pull!”

 

No.

 

“Oh dear Sharla she’s just taking stock,

This is coming as quite a big shock,

She knows what she did,

She ran and she hid,

But Sam has found his missing black sock.”

 

The teachers burst into laughter, and Sharla could only hold her burning cheeks.  Oh no!

 

“Oh Sweet Sam’s found his missing black sock!”

 

Sharla turned to walk away.  She’d just walk away from this spectacle.  How the heck did a little kit like him manage to pull something like this off?  It was nearly 400 miles from his home, and she certainly didn’t tell him where she was from, did she?  She couldn’t remember!  She was recovering from Motti laying her out when she met Sam.

 

As she turned, and began making long, quick strides to escape the intended humiliation, the teachers and the wolves all followed.  Her students arrived to find out what was going on.  What kind of kit was he?!  The minstrels continued to play.  Sharla looked back at them as she slowed down.  She’d look so foolish running away from them, wouldn’t she?  She would literally have to turn and face the music.

 

They took a break from the singing and danced in a slow circle around the blushing black sheep.

 

“Sharla, sweetie, what did you __do__!?” laughed the Sika Deer drama teacher.  This was something she’d be verbally grazing on for the rest of the damned year.

 

“I offended a small fox,” she blankly admitted.  “I apparently earned this.”

 

The minstrels, in dancing circles around her, playing their instruments with that bouncy, silly song, stopped behind her.  She turned to face them for more lyrical abuse.  She barely withheld a genuine gasp as she found the fox kit in question standing right in front of the minstrels.  She brought her hooves up to her snout, eyes wide.  How the hell was he standing there?  Wasn’t he supposed to be in school?   _ _Four hundred miles away?!__

 

“So maybe we’ve upset this poor ewe,

Should she still think our hero untrue,

Forgiven is she,

Accepting, you see,

That a ten year old fox kit got you!

 

“Oh a ten year old fox kit got youuuu!”  The three wolves trailed into a howl and the growing crowd of teachers and students exploded with laughter at that.  Sam grinned smugly at the rattled sheep and flipped a silver coin of some kind into the air with his thumb.  It landed on the sidewalk at her feet.  She bent down carefully to pick it up.

 

“What… What the…”  She took it in her hoof and turned it over, finding the words ‘GOT YOU’ in lovely gothic letters.  It was a very pretty coin.  “I don’t…” she stood to ask Sam what the heck all of this was about and was unable to keep from gasping that time.

 

The fox kit and the wolves were all gone.

 

“They’re fast.” Elijah the bobcat commented.

 

“I wonder if they play Munch?” asked one of the fox kits.

 

“I can’t believe Miss Shearer got Got,” marveled the other.  “That was awesome.”  Sharla stood there, a bit numb with a coin in her hoof to remind her forever that some heroes were immune to the scrutiny of time.

 

\-------

 

__Dear Judy,_ _

__

__I am so profoundly sorry for the previous email I sent to you last week._ _

__

__I was going to write a bunch of stuff, and wanted to tell you that I didn’t need you to worry about me, but I was interrupted as I typed the email on my phone, and accidentally hit send instead of draft somehow and… well… it wasn’t what I meant, and I know it had to have seemed that way.  I have had a rough go of it, but I have some good news._ _

__

__My stupid brother isn’t dead.  With the help of my new friends from New Reynard, I was able to find him hiding out in the woods in Deerbrook.  I can’t tell you much because of you being a part of the whole investigation situation.  Detective Pawlander, who you originally told me to get in touch with, explained what I’m able to talk about.  I can only say that he is cooperating with the ZBI, and in exchange for important information concerning documents he handled, he will not face significant punishment._ _

__

__Please tell Vivienne thank you for sending me to New Reynard.  I feel sure that I was sent to the only mammal in the world who could have found my brother.  You have made some very interesting friends in your time as a police officer._ _

__

__That brings me to the real purpose of this email._ _

__

__I can never overstate how sorry I am for how I treated you and your husband.  Nothing I could have been going through could ever excuse the things I said, or even how I felt about your new happiness.  No apology will be sufficient for the things I said to Vivienne Wilde.  I know now what kind of a mammal she is, and am bitterly regretful to have cost myself a chance at befriending a mammal like her.  Your messages to me suggested that my friendship with you might not have ended in my closed-minded lashing out, but I know it suffered.  It had to._ _

__

__I have learned ugly things about myself that I can only try to repair going forward, and hope earnestly that you will still be around to talk to me as I work through it.  Know that I do this for me, not for anyone else, as I don’t ever want to be seen as the kind of mammal I made myself out to be last week._ _

__

__Wounded by worry and grief, I was bleeding out pure rage that I might otherwise have never shown anyone, but Honey helped me to understand… regardless of what wounded me, it was still_ _ **_**_my_ ** _ ** __blood._ _

__

__I will get better.  I have to try._ _

__

__I wish you and Nick the very best, and pray that you are able to forgive me for my hurtful actions._ _

__

__With gratitude,_ _

__

__Sharla Shearer_ _

 

 

The ewe meticulously examined her carefully written email, still mortified at the unexpected item rotting in her sent folder.  She had discovered it while trying to find a copy of an email she’d sent to a parent before the holidays, and nearly screamed when she read it.  She had to have accidentally sent it when she jammed her phone back in her pocket.  This new email captured her real feelings, however.  

 

Did Judy already know about Gareth?  What Gareth had was more for the ZBI than for the Zootopia PD, but the bunny was involved in that investigation.  Had she thought that her friend just didn’t want to talk to her anymore?

 

That situation would end immediately.  Sharla clicked send and sighed, dropping her bead back on her piled up pillows in bed.  She looked down at her laptop and picked up the thick, pretty silver coin that she’d placed on the end table by her bed.  GOT YOU.  She laughed, in spite of herself.  Yeah, she was gotten.  If she was able to become friends with Nick after all she’d done, she’d ask about that.  Was it just a New Reynard thing?  One of her students seemed to see the significance of her ‘getting got’, but she didn’t dare ask him about it.

 

While she gazed at the lovely memento, her phone chimed with the ringtone set for Muzzletime.  She grinned.  It was late, but this was what she was looking forward to all afternoon!  The sheep picked up her phone from the end table and turned on her lamp to give enough light for a video call.  

 

“Hey Gareth!” she chimed as her brother’s bespectacled face came into view.

 

“Sorry!  Sorry about that!  I lost track of time!” he immediately prostrated.  

 

“It’s alright, doofus!” laughed his sister, just delighted he didn’t forget altogether.  He had so much adjusting to do, so she knew it was hard.  “It gave me some time to catch up on emails.  I’m awful about letting them sit,” she admitted.

 

“I’ve done worse,” the sheep on the other end commented, rolling his eyes.

 

“How are you doin’, though?” his sister asked with more care and concern.  “Are you eatin’ the right stuff?  Takin’ care of yourself?”

 

“Absolutely!” he replied brightly.

 

Another voice off to the side interrupted.  “Sheep lie!  He eat an entire spinach pizza only ten minutes ago!”  Motti’s face appeared beside his in the frame.

 

“Hey Motti!” laughed Sharla.

 

“It was just a medium!  Those are tiny!” the white sheep grumped.  He looked way better at least.  His wool was shorn neat and tidy again.

 

“It say serves four!” Motti disagreed.

 

Honey’s voice joined those of the sheep and hyena.  “You ate pizza like… the whole time you were hiding!  How can you still even stand the stuff?”

 

“Let me see Honey!” Sharla demanded, grinning.  It felt so good to hear her.

 

“See, there’s a badger,” Gareth detailed, turning the phone around.  They were sitting at the long, heavy meeting room table upstairs in the bed and breakfast.  On the table was a carefully made ‘scene’ with buildings and a mat with a grid pattern stenciled onto it.

 

“Are you playing a table-top game?!” cried Sharla, trying hard to stifle her laughter.

 

“Sure am!” boasted her brother.  “Didn’t Honey tell you she was into roleplaying games?”  Sharla winced, stomping down a specific memory of that and then she nodded curtly.

 

“I was aware, yeah.  Is Motti playing too?”  That seemed somehow unlikely.

 

“She is!  First time player,” explained the white sheep.

 

Sharla grinned.  “That must be… new for her.”

 

“I am playing fox ranger, is name Wajanja,” Motti confessed proudly.  “It is meaning ‘clever’.  I kill a spider already, but Wajanja almost die.  It will take time to make fox stronger!”  Sharla fought so hard not to laugh.  Her brother ruined a hyena!  Still, they all seemed so happy, and she choked slightly as she considered that she could not remember the last time she’d seen him like that.  He’d been a bit moody for months before he went missing, and now his sister knew why.

 

“I can’t… I can’t believe you have them both roped into your geeky life, Gareth,” Sharla managed to finally get out.  Her brother’s face popped back into frame, showing the pictures along the wall behind the table again.

 

“Hey, I have to fill the time somehow.  I may have to stay here for as long as six to eight __months__  they said.”  Sharla nodded at that, still smiling.  She could not hold that against him.  Playing games made the bed and breakfast feel more like home.  

 

The day that they found him in the forest, Honey and Motti agreed to take Gareth home to the bed and breakfast for his own safety.  The badger had told Sharla that she was on really good terms with an agent in the ZBI who they could trust.  Sharla was initially uncertain.  After all, that ‘Lancer’ guy was in the ZBI too, wasn’t he?

 

After taking his statement, the agent who was heading up the investigation became particularly interested in the testimony involving ‘Lancer’ and suggested he could send Gareth to a safe-house until after the major trails at least. Sharla originally hated the idea because she didn’t know that she could sleep at night knowing that Gareth was in some weird place with mammals he didn’t even know.  

 

But Agent Bay made an offer that Sharla immediately agreed to.  She’d almost forgotten that Honey had already hosted witnesses in her bed and breakfast before, and it was equipped to act as a safe house so well that it met with ZBI specifications with zero modification.  After everything they’d been through, Sharla felt confident that her brother would be okay staying with Honey and Motti until he was able to return home.  And she was able to keep in touch with him the whole time provided she agreed not to discuss his location in the calls.

 

“I’m gonna let you kids get back to your game,” offered Sharla.  “Tomorrow is STEM lab and we are doing chemical reactions, so if I’m not focused on that, someone goes home the wrong color.”  She laughed at that to make it clear to Motti that it wasn’t really dangerous.

 

“No problem.  Sorry again for almost forgetting,” Gareth replied, alone in the frame again as Motti got back to her chair.  

 

Sharla smiled broadly at her brother.  “Next time I visit, maybe I can join in your… what do you call them… Campaigns?”  Her brother’s eyes shot wide open.

 

“Wait, what?  Seriously!?” he asked with a far-too-large helping of enthusiasm.  Was she going to regret this?  Maybe.

 

“Sure!  I never gave it a try, and maybe it’s not so silly if even Motti can get into it,” the ewe expressed.

 

“Sweet!  Heck yeah!” Gareth laughed.

 

“Is fun!” Motti added.

 

“Take care, Gareth.  Be safe!” Sharla demanded.

 

“I will.  Thank you again.  For everything,” her brother said with a more serious tone.  His finger took over the frame as he ended the call.  Sharla leaned back into her pillows against the wall beside her bed with a thump.  

 

Yeah.  He was doing fine.  They all were.  Maybe things were never going to be the same, and her dad still wasn’t speaking with him because he immediately ended up under investigation just for working at Clover, but that too would probably eventually pass.

 

These were crazy times that they lived in where a text-based adventure on the internet could be the very thing that saves you at your darkest hour.  On the internet, no one knows you’re a sheep.

 

And if you stay true to who you are, maybe, just maybe, it never mattered at all.


End file.
